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CASSELL'S EEPRESENTATIVE BIOGRAPHIES. 



W. E. GLADSTONE. 



ft 



THE LIFE 



07 



MLLIAI EWART GLADSTONE. 



BY 

JOHN M^GILCHRIST. 



^^.2f v/AS^i- • 



■ TP F- T, T A TQ^ r» T» 



FELT AND DILLINGHAM, 
455, BROOME STREET, NEW YOKK. 



CONTENTS. 



— ♦ — 

FA&B 

CHAPTER I. 
Ancestry and Early Days , , , 9 

CHAPTER II. 
Early Years in Parliament 19 

CHAPTER III. 
The Great Administration of Peel , , 33 

CHAPTER IV. 
The Administration of Lord John Russell , • . , , 46 

CHAPTER V. 
Final Abandonment of Toryism . , 61 

CHAPTER VI. 
The Administration of Lord Aberdeen , 75 

CHAPTER VII. 
The Period of the Crimean War 90 

CHAPTER VIII. . 
Fall of the Palmerston Ministry 98 

CHAPTER IX. 
Lord Derby's Second Administration . , * . • . . 103 

CHAPTER X. 
The Commercial Treaty with France . , . . . • 109 

CHAPTER XI. 
The Last Whig Administration 116 

CHAPTER XII. 
The Irish Church Struggle »,,,..,, 12$ 



PEEFACE. 



In the following pages the aim of the writer has 
been to present a view at once summary and impar- 
tial of the Parliamentary career, political opinions, 
and practical enactments of the subject of the bio- 
graphy, from his first return to the Parliament 
created by the Reform Bill of 1832 down to the last 
day of the existence of the Whig Parliament of the 
middle class. The Author has not concealed hisf 
admiration of Mr. Gladstone in the fields of fiscal ; 
and electoral reform. For obvious reasons he has 
apportioned a large portion of his canvas to the 
history of the great statesman's opinions and utter- 
ances upon the Church Establishment in Ireland, 
and upon the general relations of the Church and 
the State. 

Some ancestral and personal details appear in this 
little work, in print for the first time. 



LIFE OF 

WILLIAM EWAET GLADSTONE. 



CHAPTER I. 

ANCESTRY AND EARLY DAYS. 

Shortly before the termination of Mr. Gladstone's last 
tenure of office, he visited Glasgow, where he was pre- 
sented with the freedom of that thriving and enlightened 
city. In the course of an address which he delivered 
during his visit to a large audience of working men, he ^ 
stated that he had not a particle of any but Scottish 
blood in his veins. For many generations the Gladstones 
have been settled in the small Lanarkshire town of 
Biggar; and although occupying there mediocre social 
positions, they trace themselves back to an original stock 
of lairds. The name of Gladstone, or Gladstanes, as it 
was spelt until a comparatively recent date, is traced in 
connection with the holding of land by a tenure analogous 
to the English fee-simple, to a very remote period, in the 
counties of Lanark, Peebles, Roxburgh, and Dumfries. 
The original stock from which the various cadets ramified 
was the Gladstanes of that Ilk, in the parish of Liberton, 
in the upper ward of Clydesdale, The title-deeds of the 



10 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

estate of Gladstanes, previous to the seventeenth century, 
have all been lost. It becomes therefore impossible to 
say when the family either acquired or ceased to possess 
Gladstanes. The estate of Arthurshiel, however, adjacent, 
to Gladstanes, and situate in the same parish, became the 
inheritance of a branch of the family — that branch 
through which the great English statesman traces his 
descent. It is probable that Arthurshiel was assigned 
to a younger Gladstanes, of Gladstanes, about the middle 
of the sixteenth century. It is a matter of ascertained 
fact that it was held by William, who died previous to 
1565. In a legal document, dated the 13th of March, 
1623, by Robert Chancellor, of Shieldhill, George is de- 
scribed as "the umquhile (late) George Gladstaines, of 
Arthurshiel." A William Gladstanes (probably the sou 
and heir of George) was witness to a tack (or lease), dated 
June, 1641. John Gladstanes sold the estate of Arthur- 
shiel to James Brown, of Edmonstoun, and died about 
the year 1680. 

William, the son of the last-named laird — the last of 
the Gladstones who held land to any considerable extent, 
until th*e late Sir John purchased Fasque — removed to 
Biggar, and commenced business as a maltman (or, Anglice^ 
maltster). Although at that time the population of the 
village did not much exceed a thousand, it contained no 
fewer than fourteen malting establishments in full and 
active operation. William, the maltster, died in 1728, and 
his remains lie in the family burying-ground in Liberton 
churchyard. B} his wife. Christian Brown, who was 
probably a daughter of the Laird of Edmonstoun, he left 
three sons and one daughter, Grizzel, who married a dyer 
named Thomas Cosh. One of his sons beconving unsuc- 



ANCESTRY AND EARLY DAYS. 11 

cessful in business, filled, in his old age, the offices of 
bellman and gx'ave- digger. He died in 1784. 

James, the second son, was, like his father, a maltnian. 
Of his male issue, one became an officer of excise, and 
died in 1816. Another rented a small farm, and acted 
as factor, or agent, on the Biggar estate for Admiral 
Fleming. He died about forty years ago, leaving a son 
Robert, born in 1821, who studied for the Church. 

Keverting to the main line of the ancestry of William 
Ewart Gladstone, his great-grandfather, John, grandson 
of the last Laird of Arthurshiel, was born about the year 
1693. Like so many of his kin, he was a maltman, and 
a burgess of Biggar, keeper of the Baron's Girnel, an 
active Freemason, and an elder of the kirk. His name 
very frequently occurs in the annals of the town during 
the former half of the eighteenth century. By his industry 
he acquired the means to purchase the small farm of Mid 
Toftcombs. He died on the 1st of June, 1756, asfed 
sixty-three. By his wife, Janet Aitken, he had five sons 
and six daughters. His eldest son, the great-uncle of 
the subject of our sketch, was educated for the ministry, 
but not obtaining a living, he became rector of the High 
School of Leith. Another son died at Coulter Muir, 
near Biggar, in 1776. Another, John, accepted the patri- 
mony of Mid Toftcombs, which had been declined by his 
elder brethren, and further received with his wife. Chris- 
tian Taverner, a tocher (dowry) of seven thousand merks. 
He was the leading local spirit in a movement of secession 
from the Established Church in 1780. His two sons, one 
a watchmaker in Biggar, who died in 1851, and Alex- 
ander, landlord of the Beehive Inn, in the Grassmarket 
of Edinburgh, " were both upright men." 



12 "WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

Mr. W. E. Gladstone's grandfather, Thomas, fourth 
son of John Gladstone, of Mid Toftcombs, was born on 
the 3rd of June, 1732, and died in 1809. He left home 
early in life, and settled as a corn merchant in Leitli, 
He married Helen, daughter of Walter Neilson, of 
Springfield. She bore to him sixteen children, of whom 
seven sons and five daughters grew to maturity. He 
was successful in trade, and was enabled to furnish all 
his sons with a small capit^al to start them in life. His 
eldest son, John, afterwards Sir John, was born in Leith 
in 1763. He lived to reach his eighty-eighth year, and 
after a most prosperous career, died at his mansion at 
Fasque, in Kincardineshire, in 1851. When John was 
just of age, he was sent by his father to Liverpool, to 
sell a cargo of grain which had arrived at that port. 
He so attracted the attention of a leading corn merchant 
there, that the latter earnestly entreated his father to let 
his son settle at that port. After sundry negotiations, 
the result was the formation of the firm of Corrie, Glad- 
stone, and Bradshaw, corn merchants; Mr. Corrie taking 
the two latter young men into partnership. The firm had 
hardly existed two years, ere its stability was very sorely 
tried. There came a general failure of the corn crops 
throughout Europe. Mr. Corrie at once dispatched his 
junior partner, Mr. Gladstone, to the United States, to 
buy grain. John Gladstone was then about twenty- 
four years of age. Having the needful letters of credit, 
he started upon a mission of which the parties to it 
entertained the most sanguine hopes. On reaching 
America, he found that the corn crops had failed there 
also, and that there was not a single bushel to be pro- 
cured. To his dismay, by the next advices which Jie 



ANCESTRY AND EARLY DAYS. 13 

received from England, he was informed that some 
twenty-four large vessels had been chartered to bring 
home the grain which he was supposed to have bought. 
The situation was most perilous, and it seemed that the 
prospects of so young a man were fairly shipwrecked. 
Indeed, when the news became known at Liverpool, it 
was considered impossible for the house to recover the 
shock arising from so many vessels returning in ballast 
instead of bearing the cargoes which they had been 
chartered to convey. Corrie and Co. were therefore re- 
garded as a doomed house, and the deepest commiseration 
was felt for the young absent partner, while the senior 
was blamed for his precipitancy. But young Gladstone, 
though strongly impressed with the difficulties of the 
position in which he found himself, maintained unim- 
paired his courage and presence of mind. He sought 
every means by which to lighten, if not to avert the 
blow. By careful examination of price lists, by ascer- 
taining what procurable products would best suit the 
English market, he succeeded, without waste of time, in 
filling the holds of all the vessels. And when all was 
sold and realised, the net loss on the large transaction of 
the house hardly expeeded .£500. 

From that time John Gladstone became a marked 
man on the Liverpool Exchange, and in the English 
commercial world. He became the leading spirit in his 
house, and for some fourteen years more the partnership 
continued, ending naturally by effluxion of time. The 
corn dearth had continued, and so widely spread, that 
the Administratioi* determined to hold stores of grain 
at the different ports. Corrie, Gladstone, and Brad- 
shaw were appointed the Government agents at Liver- 



14 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

pool, a fact which recognised their holding the leading 
position in the trade. They were so successful that at 
the close of the partnership the sum of no less than 
.£75,000 stood to the credit of the guarantee account 
alone. Corrie retired wealthy, and Bradshaw returned 
early in life to his native town, Wigan, where he lived 
for many years. 

John Gladstone continued in business, taking his 
brother Robert into partnership, and engaged largely in 
the trade with Russia. They also became large West 
India merchants and sugar importers. As Liverpool 
offered a more enterprising field than Leith, three other of 
the brothers soon followed John and Robert, and even- 
tually all the seven were settled there. It was about 
this time that Mr. Brougham, while going the Northern 
Circuit, was John Gladstone's guest, and accompanied his 
host to the Liverpool Theatre. The play was "Macbeth," 
and Kean played the chief character. When Macduff said, 
" Stands Scotland where it did ? " a Scotchman in the 
gallery cried out, " Na, na, sirs ; there's pairt o' 
Scotland in England noo — there's John Gladstone and 
his clan." 

The Gladstones were the first to send a private 
vessel (the Kingsmill) to Calcutta, upon the opening of 
the East India and China trades to other than East 
India Company's vessels, in 1814. From that time to 
the present, the family have been extensively engaged 
in that trade. The house of Robertson Gladstone 
(John's second son) is one of the first firms in Liver- 
pool, having very large relations with every part of the 
East. 

It was but natural that so energetic a character as 



ANCESTRY AND EARLY DAYS. 15 

John Gladstone should take a deep interest in the public 
affairs of the town in which he lived. As he was always 
opposed to the close and self-elected municipal corpora- 
tion of the ante-Reform Bill days, it is not to be won- 
dered at that he was never elected to any corporate 
office, but he was the means of removing very many 
local abuses and restrictive imposts which bore heavily 
against the interests of the port. A very valuably service 
of plate was presented to him in recognition of what he 
had effected, many of the subscribers being his strongest 
opponents on corporation matters of dispute. At that 
period Liverpool was like a young giant, though not con- 
taining one-fifth of its present population. Supported 
at the back by the great products of manufacture from 
Yorkshire, Lancashire, Staffordshire, Warwickshire, and 
Cheshire, with immediate access to coal and salt, it be- 
came the port of shipment to all parts of the world, and 
by 1832 the declared value of its exports exceeded that 
of London itself. 

In political opinion John Gladstone was what would 
now be termed a Liberal Conservative, and his desire was 
to have the best men to represent the town, to some extent 
independently of their being ardent partisans of either 
of che two great parties. When the celebrated William 
Koscoe retired from the representation, Mr. Gladstone was 
desirous that George Canning and Henry Brougham should 
be returned. They were then in their early prime, and 
gradually becoming regarded as the two leading men of 
the day. But Brougham selected Creevey, a very extreme 
Badical, and a man of little or no public standing, as his co- 
candidate, and Gladstone declined to support the two in 
alliance. He therefore threw his weight on the side of 



16 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

General Gascoyne, a member of the family of Salesbury, 
holding large property near the town. A remarkably 
severe contest, lasting fourteen days, ensued; and the 
result, niainly through John Gladstone's influence, was 
the return of Gascoyne and Canning. From this date 
there existed a very close intimacy between Mr. Canning 
and Mr. Gladstone, an intimacy which exercised a very 
important influence upon the mind and career of his 
distinguished son. Throughout Canning's prematurely 
shortened life, he consulted Mr. Gladstone on all im- 
portant mercantile affairs. Ere long, at th^ suggestion 
of Canning. GJ[adstone solicited return to Parliament, 
being provided oy the Marlborough family with a seat 
for their pocket borough of Woodstock. He remained 
long enough in Parliament to be witness of the earlier 
triumphs of his youngest son. 

John Gladstone was twice man^flS. He does not 
appear to have had any issue by his first wife. He 
married secondly Ann Robertson, of Stornoway, N.B., 
daughter of Andrew Robertson, who had been Provost of 
Dingwall. Miss Robertson was a native of Dingwall. 
One who knew her well testifies that she was " a lady of 
very great accomplishments, of fascinating manners, of 
commanding presence and high intellect; one to grace 
any home and endear any heart." By her he had a 
family of four sons and two daughters. Of these, three 
sons — Sir Thomas, Bart.,ofFasque, Robertson, the Liver- 
pool merchant, and William Ewart — and one daughter, 
who is unmarried, survive. John Neilson, a captain in 
the navy, and M.P. for Portarlington, died a few years 
ago. John Gladstone was made a baronet by Sir Robert 
Peel in 184o. He died in 1851. Besides the provisioa 



ANCESTRY AND EARLY DAYS. 17 

made for his family by will, he gave to each of his sons 
£100,000 in his lifetime. 

With such parents as John Gladstone and Ann 
Kobertson, it was most natural that the development 
of the minds of each of their children should be carefully 
watched, and any germs of excellence which should 
appear be as sedulously cultivated. William Ewart was 
born on the 29th of December, 1809, in the same bedroom 
as that in which, five years later, his friend Mr. Cardwell 
first saw the light. The Cardwell family purchased the 
residence of Mr. Gladstone on his removing from one 
house to another. In the youth there was soon perceived 
an uncommon perspicacity and comprehensiveness of 
mind. Its early characteristic was a firm grasp and 
encompassment of anything set before it. He was for- 
tunate in his early preceptors. They still live to be 
cheered by the growing fame and usefulness of their 
pupil. One is the Eev. Mr. Bawson, the other the 
Venerable Archdeacon Jones. At Oxford, to which he 
was sent, after passing with credit through Eton, he 
achieved high academic distinction; and also in the 
Union Debating Society, he gave similar promise of 
oratorical celebrity. He passed Double Fii'st with com- 
parative ease. At once his father's wishes and his own 
inclinations determined him to study for no profession, 
but to devote himself solely to public life. 

While his education, in the ordinary sense, was going 
on, there was a course of instruction being imparted of at 
least an equally valuable character. His preceptor was 
his father, who strove to communicate to his son, from 
the period of his earliest childhood, his own stores of 
natural and extended knowledge. Much of the high 

B 



18 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

eminence which Mr. Gladstone, altogether apart from 
party considerations, has attained as a financier, must be 
traced to the thorough initiation into the principles of 
business operations, on the largest scale, which his father 
imparted. When young Gladstone was but twelve years 
of age, his father would discuss with him after dinner 
any leading financial or political question of the day. It 
was curious for the guests occasionally present, to see 
experience proposing, and youth weighing, examining, 
and discussing, questions frequently of a very com- 
plicated character ; the interest of both talkers being all 
the keener that England was at the time passing through 
one of the most exciting epochs of her history. Mr. 
Canning was invariably a guest at Mr. Gladstone's house 
at Seaforth, when he went down to Liverpool to meet his 
constituents, and frequently predicted that a distinguished 
career was before the youth. 



CHAPTER II. 

EARLY YEARS IN PARLIAMENT. 

Shortly after Mr. Gladstone left Oxford, he went for 
several months on a tour on the Continent, accompanied, 
we believe, by more than one of his Eton and Christ- 
church contemporaries and friends. Among the warmest 
friendships which he had contracted at school and college, 
were those with Mr. Sidney Herbert and Lord Lincoln, 
afterwards Lord Herbert of Lea and Duke of New- 
castle. It was the father of the latter — the then duke — 
to whom Mr. Gladstone was indebted for his first seat in 
Parliament. The borough of Newark was largely under 
the control of the ducal house of Pelham- Clinton ; and 
although in the momentous and exciting general elec- 
tion of December, 1832, which succeeded the final passage 
of the Reform Bill, the Liberals hotly contested the 
borough, Mr. Gladstone, as a true blue Tory and the 
duke's nominee, came in at the head of the poll, winning, 
however, only by some sixty votes out of more than 
eleven hundred which were recorded. 

During the first year or two in which he enjoyed his 
seat, he spoke little, and what little he did say is reported 
^ with great brevity in contemporary records. Amongst 
his early speeches were one against the ballot, and an 
apologetic address for the mayor, corporation, and freemen 
of his native town, whom a committee of the House of 

B 2 



20 . WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

Commons had found guilty of the most flagrant bribery at 
the general election, but in whose behalf, and successfully, 
Mr. Gladstone deprecated the extreme penal visitations 
which certain very ardent parliamentary spirits counselled. 
The line of argument adopted against the ballot — and of 
his opinion hostile to it Mr. Gladstone has not yet enun- 
ciated any recantation — was to this effect : — The ballot 
could be nothing unless secrecy were observed ; but how 
could it be observed if the public functionaries who were 
to take the ballot, and who might probably not be always 
selected for their highly strict and honourable principles, 
could become acquainted with the votes given by different 
individuals 1 If they should become acquainted with the 
votes, they would acquire a power over the voters, which 
would make them the petty tyrants of the districts in 
which they resided. But if strict silence were to be 
observed, it would put an end to all public discussion. 
Another objection was, that the ballot would make the 
constitution of the House still more democratic than it 
now was. He thought that at present it was democratic 
enough, and, therefore, he openly opposed it on that 
ground. Another ground of objection was, that after 
the experiment of last year, it would be too much to 
carry on the principle of reform so much farther without 
any experience of the working of what they had already 
done. 

One of the most sagacious of the many acts of sagacity 
which distinguished the public life of Sir Kobert Peel, 
was his attracting to himself the more promising of the 
youthful members of his own party. In this his policy 
stood out in strong and favourable contrast to the course 
adopted by the Whigs, who have ever considered office 



EARLY YEARS IN PARLIAMENT. 21 

the close borough and prescriptive appanage of the mem- 
bei'S of a restricted number of noble and, so to speak, 
professionally official families. With Peel it was quite 
otherwise. He wished on the one hand to train a school 
of well-drilled followers ; and on the other, without 
ignoring the just claims of the veterans who had fought 
by his side the hard contested combats of the past, to 
reward youthful promise and endeavour by early pro- 
motion. Young Gladstone ■ was soon marked out for 
this distinction. Peel quickly discovered his worth and 
usefulness ; and the opportunity for recognising it with 
the laurel wreath of active employment came sooner 
than either could have anticipated. Meanwhile, the 
youthful aspirant, while attending diligently to the busi- 
ness and routine of the noble field of exertion into which 
his good fortune had permitted him to make entrance at 
such an almost boyish age, showed by his reticence at 
once his modesty, his patience, and his excellent sense. 

Mr. Gladstone had been just two years in Parliament 
when he became a minister of the Crown. In the winter 
of 1834, changes of various descriptions — changes by 
death, by resignation, by the elevation of the most 
popular member of the Reform Administration, Lord 
Althorp, to the Upper House by the demise of his 
father, which rendered it impossible that he should 
longer hold the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer ; 
but above all, a considerable downfall of the popularity 
of the Whigs — furnished to the king the opportunity 
long desired by him, of getting quit of his Whig ministers. 
He sent for the Duke of Wellington. The duke con- 
sented to hold the seals of the Premiership only until 
a despatch could be sent to Pome to summon Sir Pobert 



22 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

Peel, who, with his wife, had started for a tour in 
Italy; so little did he imagine the likelihood of any- 
impending transference of political power. The following 
extracts from the " Journal " of Mr. Raikes will suffi- 
ciently indicate the excitement of the occasion : — 

" It is announced that Sir Eobert Peel has accepted the Ministry. 
His brother, Colonel [now General] Peel, stated the fact at M. Dupin's 
soiree. . . . Sir R. Peel arrived at the H&tel Bristol [Mr. Kaikes 
was living in Paris] at eleven o'clock last night. This morning he 
received the visit of Lord Granville, and at eleven o'clock left Paris for 
London, 'big with the fate of Caesar and of Kome.' . . . The 
arrangements of the Ministry are in full train. . . . The Adminis- 
tration is formed without any coalition, and is of pure Conservative 
principles." 

When the list of Cabinet and minor ministers came 
out, Mr. W. E. Gladstone's name appeared as a Junior 
Lord of the Treasury. Sir Robert Peel found it desir- 
able and necessary to dissolve Parliament; and in his 
letter to the electors of Tamworth issued a manifesto, of 
which this sentence contained the essential purport : — 
" With regard to the Reform Bill, I will now repeat the 
declaration which I made when I entered the House of 
Commons as a member of the Reformed Parliament, that 
I consider the Reform Bill a final and irrevocable settle- 
ment of a great constitutional question, a settlement 
which no friend to the peace and welfare of the country 
would attempt to disturb, either by indirect or by insidious 
means." Starting from this as a stipulation and fixed 
principle, he proposed to govern the country in a spirit 
of Conservatism (a political term then used for the first 
time), but expressed a readiness to carry into efiect 
certain minor reforms in our domestic system. Mr. 
Gladstone followed suit responsively in his address and 



EARLY YEARS IN PARLIAMENT, 23 

speeches to the electors of Newark, where he was again 
returned at the head of the poll, but with a Whig, Ser- 
jeant Wilde, for a colleague. Mr. Raikes, reflecting the 
average Tory opinion, thus wrote of the policy of the first 
Administration of which Mr. Gladstone was a member : — 
" Sir Robert Peel's address has arrived. It is a manly and 
sensible document, calculated to inspire confidence in the 
country ; expressing readiness to reform real abuses and 
defects, without seeking for a false popularity by adopting 
every fleeting popular impression of the day, and promising 
the instant redress of anything which any one may call 
an abuse." 

There had unquestionably arisen in the country a 
strong reaction against Whig rule. The Whigs had been 
far from realising popular expectation, and the disappoint- 
ment had been especially felt by the Radicals and 
" O'Connell's tail ;" nevertheless, the reaction was not so 
great as to enable Peel's Ministry to stand its ground. 
When Parliament met. Ministers were beaten by ten in 
the election of a Speaker. A few days after, an amend- 
ment to the address from the Throne was carried by a 
majority of seven. The end was evidently impending; 
and though Sir Robert Peel remained in office, showing 
singular patience and tact, until April, he had then no 
option but to resign, being defeated by a large and deci- 
sive majority on certain resolutions afiecting the tempo- 
ralities of the Irish Church, drawn with characteristic skill 
and astuteness by Lord John Russell. Mr. Gladstone 
resigned the Under- Secretaryship of the Colonial Office, to 
which he had been transferred in February, and in which 
post, by the admission of both sides, he showed remark- 
able signs not only of administrative ability, but of con- 



24 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

ciliatoriness of spirit. The latter qualification was mvicli 
needed, as several of our colonies then evinced great 
and just irritation at the policy of the home govern- 
ment. Mr. Gladstone's name is not to be found recorded 
in any of the more than usually acrimonious encounters 
which characterised the short-lived first Ministry of his 
groat master, Peel. How irritated both parties were, 
and how much more remarkable was, therefore, his 
modest and placable reticence, may be gathered from these 
sentences of Mr. Kaikes, which precisely reflect the 
temper of the times : — "Monday, 1 6th March. Party spirit 
rages with great violence throughout society in London. 
The disappointed "Whigs are ready for any measures which 
may perplex the duke's government, and are publicly 
coalescing with the Radicals to turn them out. Though 
the feeling of the country is daily becoming stronger in 
favour of the Tories, yet the two other parties form a 
fearful opposition in the House, and every expedient of 
threat and ridicule is put in force to keep those who have 
once voted for the Reform Bill still fettered to their dic- 
tates. They are betting two to one in their den at 
Brookes' s, that the Government does not last two 
months." 

For the next two years Mr. Gladstone spoke but seldom. 
"We believe that over-exertion had somewhat injuriously 
affected a constitution which, at that time at least, 
was by no means robust. When the Canadian troubles, 
which furnished matter for such prolonged and embittered 
controversy, arose, he enrolled himself decidedly on the 
side of the authority of the Crown. From him, at least, 
Papineau and his rebellious associates received no coun- 
tenance or sympathy. In 1837 we find him arguing that 



EARLY YEARS IN PARLIAMENT. 25 

the simple question that lay before the Imperial Legisla- 
ture, was the support of government and public order on 
one side, and the absolutism of the popular will on the 
other. Not a single practical grievance had been sub- 
stantiated by the Canadian Assembly with respect to the 
undue preference of the English race. It appeared that, 
during the administration of the last two governments, 
of eighteen appointments to the Legislative Council, ten 
had been given to persons of French origin. This might 
not seem to represent the proportion of the French popu- 
lation to the British ; but it should be remembered that 
the former did not compose so large a proportion of the 
upper class, from which the members of the Legislative 
Council were of necessity selected. In this and other 
speeches delivered on the same and similar themes, during 
the next few years, discerning men saw a ripening, and 
possibly an ambition, for the seals of the Colonial Office. 

As is well known, slavery in all British colonies and 
dependencies was abolished in 183,4, Negro apprentice- 
ship, as it was called, however, was reserved until 1840, 
when the last remaining link of enslavement was to be 
removed. A very strong agitation arose in 1838, to 
have the period of final emancipation ante- dated by two 
years. Lord Brougham was the leader of the movement, 
the pious and humanitarian classes constituted its rank 
and file, and the most efiective of its .professional expo- 
nents was Mr. George Thompson. The agitation was 
soon extended to the floors of both Houses of Parliament. 
Mr. Gladstone took the unpopular side. He had the 
honour of winding up one of the most animated of the 
debates of the year (1838). This, in one sense, may be 
considered the first great speech delivered by Mr. Glad- 



26 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

stone. It was the first which took a thorough and 
decisive grip of the public mind. It was the first to 
which the honour of an elaborate two-column report was 
given in the Times. Lastly, and most important of all, 
it was the first which Mr. Gladstone himself published in 
a revised pamphlet form. We therefore reproduce as 
copious a summary of it as the necessities of our space 
will allow : — The question, he said, was to the colonists 
a matter not of property alone, but of character ; and he 
would prove that they were guiltless of the oppressions 
imputed to them. The report of the committee of which 
Mr. Buxton was chairman, and which had continued its 
sittings to the end of last session, had, with Mr. Buxton's 
concurrence, negatived the necessity for this change. 
Perhaps there was no compact in a legal sense, but in a 
moral one there was. The apprenticeship was a part of 
the compensation, and the labour due under it had a 
marketable value, of which it was unjust to deprive the 
master or his assigns. He deprecated an appeal to mere 
individual instances. There were cases of abuse, no 
doubt j but the question was, were the abuses general 1 
To prove that they were not, he would take, point by 
point, the public reports of magistrates, and even 
governors. He then, by a variety of citations, pro- 
ceeded to prove, that on every one of the heads of com- 
plaint the satisfactory cases exceeded, four or five times 
over, the unsatisfactory ones, and showed an improve- 
ment under the system of apprenticeship, of which this 
may serve as an example, that in British Guiana, where, 
in the last year of slavery, the number of lashes in- 
flicted had been 280,000, the number inflicted, on the 
average of the years elapsed since the apprenticeship, had 



EARLY YEARS IN PARLIAMENT. 27 

been only 684. The flogging of females, under any cir- 
cumstances, was odious and indefensible ; but this motion 
could not affect that practice ; because, when females are 
flogged, it is not as apprentices, but as disorderly persons 
— the same punishment being inflicted on free women. 
He did not shrink from inquiry ; but with facts such as 
those he had proved, he could not help thinking that 
the state of the apprentices had but little to require 
the attention of humane persons, while such grievances 
remained unredressed as the condition of the factory 
children, and the system of the foreign slave-trade. 

The Times, of the day succeeding the delivery of the 
elaborate address thus summarised, remarked : — '' This 
speech, which was both candid and accurate, produced 
considerable efiect, and brought the debate to a satis- 
factory close." And in a leading article of the day 
following, the speaker was at once commended, and cer- 
tain of his conclusions questioned. " Mr. Gladstone's 
eloquent and able speech was calculated to weaken, not 
remove, many persuasions, amounting to prejudices, with 
regard to the extent of those misdeeds and criminal 
abuses of the Abolition Act which have constituted the 
cliief materials of the agitation raised by Lord Brougham 
and his accomplices of Exeter Hall. Still there is much 
matter of obloquy, from which neither Sir George nor 
Mr. Gladstone has succeeded in exonerating the West 
Indian proprietors. There have been complaints of 
oppression and exaction brought home against planters 
in Jamaica and other colonies, and although it may be 
taken for granted that the conduct thus represented forms 
the exception, not the rule, it cannot be denied that the 
House of Assembly of Jamaica has not merely omitted, 



28 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

but obstinately refused, to pass certain laws and regula- 
tions which were indispensable to the fulfilment of their 
portion of the compact framed in 1834, and to the equi- 
valent required of that Assembly for the benefits secured 
to the proprietors by the grant of X20,000,000, and the 
allowance of six years' apprenticeship." 

Our readers will now be able to appreciate our 
motive in withholding at its proper place Mr. Gladstone's 
maiden speech. We present it now, as a gloss upon 
what has just preceded, and as distinctly showing that 
Mr. Gladstone, from the first day of his appearance in 
Parliament, although his father and other near kinsmen 
held slaves, had no love for slavery. He voted for the 
abolition of slavery ; and the first words he ever uttered 
in St. Stephen's Hall, were uttered on the occasion of his 
presenting a petition from inhabitants of the borough of 
Portarlington in favour of the abolition of slavery. A 
few days before, Lord Howick (now Earl Grey) had 
accused Mr. Gladstone, senior, of shortening by hard 
usage the lives of his field hands in the colony of 
Demerara. We quote verbatim from the Times of May 
18, 1833 : — *' Mr. Gladstone presented a similar petition 
from Portarlington. The hon, member then alluded to 
certain observations by a noble lord in his speech to the 
House on Tuesday night. The noble lord had made 
selection of an estate in Demerara, belonging to some of 
his (Mr. Gladstone's) nearest relatives, for the purpose of 
showing what a destruction of human life had taken 
place in the West Indies, from the manner in which the 
slaves were worked. The mortality which had taken 
place in that colony was to be attributed to a totally 
different cause. In consequence of the falling off which 



EARLY YEARS IN PARLIAMENT. 29 

had taken place in the coffee trade, and also in the trade 
in cotton, it was found expedient to apply the slaves to 
the cultivation of sugar, which was a much more un- 
healthy employment. The population upon the estate of 
his father was, however, in a state of increase." 

The repute of Mr. Gladstone was now fairly esta- 
blished, and he had become a man marked out for high 
office. True, about the years 1839 and 1840 he to some 
extent risked his repute with the masses by the strong posi- 
tion which he took against the claims of the Jews to poli- 
tical enfranchisement, and against those of the Dissenters 
for State aid for the education of their children. Take, 
as a fair specimen, the following summary of a speech 
against Jewish Emancipation : — Lord Morpeth had de- 
clared, as long as the State continued to finger Unitarian 
gold, it could not refuse to extend to those by whom it so 
profits the blessing of education, and assist those sects 
which must otherwise remain in intellectual darkness. 
Now, if the State were to be regarded as having no other 
fimction than that of representing the mere will of the 
people as to religious tenets, he admitted the truth of this 
principle, but not if they were to hold that the State was 
capable of duties, and that the State could have a con- 
science. He did not wish to say anything offensive; it 
was not his habit to revile religion, under whatever form 
it was presented to him ; but what ground was there for 
confining the noble lord's reasoning to Christianity ? 
Mr. Gladstone then read to the House a passage from a 
petition lately presented from the Protestant Dissenters : 
*' That your petitioners feel the deepest gratitude for the 
expression of Her Majesty's most gracious wish that the 
youth of this country should be religiously brought up^ 



30 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

and the rights of conscience respected, while they earnestly 
hope that the education of the people, Jewi;;h and Chris- 
tian, will be sedulously connected with a due regard to 
the Holy Scriptures." How was the education of the 
Jewish people, who considered the New Testament an 
imposture, to be sedulously connected with a due regard 
to the Holy Scriptures, which consisted of the Old and 
New Testaments ? To force the Jewish children to read 
the latter would be directly contrary to the principles ot 
honourable gentlemen opposite. He wished to see no 
child forced to do so, but he protested against paying 
from the money of the State a set of men whose business 
would be to inculcate erroneous doctrines. The propo- 
sition he held to be very different from that upon which 
the claims of the Roman Catholics and Dissenters were 
founded. With them w<e had the same common bonds 
of belief in the same redemption. There were also con- 
siderations which broadly distinguished their case from 
that of the Jews. The one adhered as strongly as our- 
selves to the text of Christianity, the other did not. 
The one constituted a large majority in one portion of 
the United Kingdom — ^the others were scarcely percep- 
tible on the face of English society. So much as to 
numbers ; how as to grievances ? He was not aware 
that the Jews had any special ones to complain of No 
allegation of this kind had ever been made. It was to 
be borne in mind that there were still some offices to 
which the religious test was strictly applied :— to the 
holder of the Crown, to the Lord Chancellor, and to 
certain great offices in Ireland. ... In intro- 
ducing these men to Parliament and other high offices, 
there existed an absolute tendency to disqualify Par- 



EARLY YEARS IN PARLIAMENT. 31 

liament for the performance of any duties connected 
with religion, and, by easy transitions, to overturn the 
very principles on which the constitution of this nation 
is based. 

On the 25th of July, 1839, ere he had completed 
his twenty-ninth year, Mr, Gladstone entered into the 
holy bonds of matrimony. All political London knows 
Mrs. Gladstone's talents ; all fashionable London knows 
her graces. It is but few of our English readers who 
need to be informed of her large-hearted benevolence 
and readiness to engage in all good works. It seems 
not to us any transgression of good taste to remark that 
God has blessed the premier Liberal statesman of our 
times with a partner who has proved herself to be a help- 
meet in every sense, in the real, as well as in the 
conventional sense of the term. Mrs. Gladstone was 
a daughter of Sir Stephen Richard Glynne, of Ha warden 
Castle, Flintshire. At the same time that Miss Catherine 
Glynne became Mrs. Gladstone, her sister Mary became 
the wife of Mr. Gladstone's life-long friend. Lord Lyttel- 
ton. . Providence has blessed Mrs. Gladstone with seven 
children, one of whom she has had -the satisfaction of 
seeing sitting behind her husband in the House of 
Commons. Miss Catherine Glynne may well have been 
' proud of the handsome bridegroom of whom Macaulay 
had written a few weeks before the celebration of their 
nuptials, in his well-known review of Gladstone's " State 
in its Kelations with the Church : " — 

"The author is a young man of unblemished cha- 
racter and of distinguished Parliamentary talent. His 
ability and his demeanour have gained for him the re- 
spect and good- will of all parties. It is his first appear- 



32 WILLIAM EWAET GLADSTONE. 

ance as an author. His mind is of a large grasp, nor is 
he deficient in dialectical skill. . . . ^Ve dissent from his 
opinion; we admire his talents; we respect his integrity 
and his benevolence; and we hope he will not let poli- 
tical avocations so entirely engross him as to leave him 
no leisure for literature and philosophy." 



CHAPTER III. 

THE GREAT ADMINISTRATION OF PEEL. 

" Out of the Cabinet, the mo^t notable man was, perhaps, 
Mr. W. E. Gladstone, who was Vice-President of the 
Board of Trade, and Master of the Mint. The character 
of his mind was not very clearly understood; and the 
prevalent doubt was whether he understood it himself ; 
but enough was known of his seriousness, his thoughtfal- 
ness, and his conscientiousness, to cause him to be regarded 
with emphatic respect and hope, at a time when earnest 
men were to be prized above all others." So wrote Miss 
Martineau in 1850 ; and' her words exactly reflected the 
esteem in which such earnest thinkers as herself regarded 
Mr. Gladstone at that period of his life at which we have 
now arrived. 

In 1841, the people were thoroughly sick of the 
Whigs. Their disappointment was all the greater that 
their expectations, but a few years previously, had been 
so rapturous. No aspect ot their policy was popular. 
Even so staunch a "Whig as Sydney Smith jeered at them, 
and expressed an ironical desire that one of the chief 
members of the Ministry, Mr. Spring Rice, would go into 
holy orders. They had alienated the rabble by their 
Poor Law. With their Irish allies they had had a 
thorough split. The Radicals and the Dissenters, their 

C 



34 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

former loyal henchmen, had disclaimed all allegiance 
with them. And, lastly, they had so mismanaged the 
finances of the country, as to have gone on increasing 
the annual deficit in the revenue, until, in 1841, it 
amounted to the enormous sum of two millions and 
a half The great cry in the country was for able 
financiers and business men. The opportunity for Peel 
and his followers had fairly arrived. He gained, in the 
summer of 1841, a large majority against Melbourne, 
upon which Parliament was immediately dissolved. The 
election was a most stirring and exciting one; bribery 
was more than usually rife ; each side, as is usual, being 
about equally culpable. The result was an enormous 
majority for the Conservatives. In the English consti- 
tuencies they had a clear preponderance of 104. Against 
that, the Whigs could show only majorities of nine in 
Scotland, and nineteen in Ireland. Mr. Gladstone again 
3tood for Newark ; the colleague of his candidature was 
his future political antagonist, Lord John Manners ; and 
they were opposed by a Whig, one of the Hobhouses. 
Mr. Hobhouse got but 380 votes, while Lord John and 
Mr. Gladstone polled respectively 633 and 630. 

Shortly after the opening of Parliament, Peel, by a 
majority of seventy, carried a vote of no confidence. 
Three days after, on the 30th of August, he was Prime 
Minister, and in a few days after, Mr. Gladstone was 
created a Privy Councillor, and made Vice-President of 
the Board of Trade, and Master of the Mint. The former 
office was most congenial, and, as we shall see, he dis- 
charged its duties so admirably, that he fairly earned his 
promotion to the Presidency of the Board, on the retire- 
ment of Lord Ripon in 1843. 



THE GREAT ADMINISTRATION OP PEEL. . 35 

Peel came in without explicit declaration of his policy. 
When somewhat peevishly pressed by the Whigs to declare 
himself, he proudly stated that he could not concoct 
instantaneously the details of his political programme, 
and that he claimed the period of the recess in which to 
mature it. The country thoroughly acquiesced in the 
justice of this demand. All that he enunciated was his 
continued preference for a " sliding" over a "fixed duty " 
on corn, and certain general avowals of minor amend- 
ments. 

All through the winter the direst distress prevailed. 
Starvation left her traces on every side. Murders and 
lesser crimes were terribly prevalent. There were Char- 
tist murders (at least murders attributed to Chartists), 
trades' union murders, incendiary murders. Even her 
Majesty was hooted in London theatres ; and some of 
the lower Radical papers printed in parallel columns the 
accounts of the festivities at Buckingham Palace and 
the accounts of the inquests held on wretches starved to 
death. 

Meanwhile, as the event proved. Sir Robert Peel and 
Mr. Gladstone were working hard preparing the fiscal 
measures w^hich all were so anxiously waiting for. Sir 
Robert, in the course of his statement, said that he 
believed the maximum of indirect taxation had been 
reached, and that the overburdened land could bear no 
more ; he had no hopes, tlierefore, of getting quit of the 
deficit which his predecessors had left them, by legislation 
. in this direction. Direct taxation was the only means 
of retreat. He therefore bravely proposed to impose 
an income tax of sevenpence in the pound, for three 
years, on all incomes of £150 a year and upwards. This 

c 2 



36 WILLIAM EWAET GLADSTONE. 

would enable liim to make certain important reductions 
of indirect taxation. By his income tax he would tem- 
porarily tax wealth and competence ; but that only 
seemingly, for the contributors of income tax would 
be fully reimbursed by the cheapening of their com- 
modities. The following significant sentence was greeted 
with rapturous cheers from the Liberal benches : — "I 
believe that in the general principle of free trade there 
is now no great difference of opinion, and that all agree 
in the general rule that we should purchase in the 
cheapest market and sell in the dearest." The Duke 
of Buckingham had meanwhile retired from so teachable 
a cabinet, and from this day the power of Peel waned 
with the Tories of the old school. In the future triumphs 
of his great Administration, he was sustained by Glad- 
stone and his other loyal and well-drilled lieutenants, 
and by the opposition benches. 

Ere making his comprehensive statement. Peel had, 
with (doubtless) intentional significance, taken the docu- 
m.ent from which he quoted his figures and details, from 
the hands of Gladstone, who sat close beside him. And 
it was but fitting that he should do so ; for the great 
revised Customs Tariff of 1842 was, under the general 
direction of Peel, the sole and unaided handiwork of Mr. 
Gladstone. It was as admirably executed in details as it 
was complete in its mastery of principles. At one bold 
stroke, 750 of the 1,200 duty-paying articles were either 
entirely relieved of all taxation, or the duty was reduced 
in the following proportions : — A maximum of five per 
cent., ad valorem^ on raw materials ; of twelve per cent. 
on partially, and twenty per cent, on wholly manufac- 
tured articles. And this gigantic change, so pregnant 



THE GREAT ADMINISTRATION OP PEEL. 37 

with immediate and ultimate future good, was effected at 
an immediate cost to tlie revenue of but £270,000. It 
devolved on Mr. Gladstone to fight the measure through, 
clause by clause, in committee. And most assiduously 
did he discharge his task ; talking now of cassava, to- 
morrow of onions ; on one night of salted meat, the next 
of dried herrings. We thus summarise the gist of scores 
of such speeches. 

The income tax was intended to tax wealth ; the 
new tariff to relieve manufacturing industry. Thus, 
take the case of foreign woods. Owing to the high 
duties, we had not previously been able to keep them, 
and make them into furniture at home ; but they had 
been re-imported out of bond into France and Germany, 
whence they returned to us manufactured into furniture. 
Now there was hope that we should not only make our 
own furniture, but become exporters of it. The same 
prospects applied to the woods used for dyeing. Copper 
had been sent away on account of the duties, while we 
had actually to import it back again after it had been 
smelted with our own coal. As to colonial timber, for 
building purposes, it would be admitted duty free, and 
the impost on Baltic timber reduced to the lowest point 
consistent with our engagements with our colonists. The 
greatest authority on free-trade subjects, Mr. Deacon 
Hume, had said, that if we had untaxed timber, as we 
had untaxed coal and iron, we should be provided with 
the three great primary materials of employment and 
consumption. This we were henceforth to have. Our 
ship-building would increase and improve, and a gi'eat 
impetus would be given to our fisheries. 

But perhaps the most interesting of the proposed 



38 WILLIAM EWAET GLADSTONE. 

changes were those relating to food. Farmers would 
benefit by the free introduction of clover and other seed, 
hitherto highly taxed; and the community at large 
would derive the greatest advantages from the freer 
ingress of cattle, salted meat, and fish. The agricul- 
tural and other interests hotly contested the relaxa- 
tion of these duties ; but large majorities in every case 
sustained the propositions of the Premier and his truly 
ejfficient lieutenant. Difficulties innumerable had to be 
overcome. "Men might differ, and did differ, whether 
this tariff was valuable only as a move in the right direc- 
tion, or whether it would also achieve what its authors 
hoped, in the extension of trade, and the improvement 
of comfort : but none — unless it were a few bigots in and 
out of Parliament — doubted the Customs Act Reform to 
be a good thing. One gentleman would have free trade 
in everything but herrings ; another in everything but 
straw plait ; and Sir Robert Peel and Lord John Russell 
in everything but corn; but these sepai'ate opinions 
merged in general satisfaction that, out of 1,200 articles 
that paid customs duties, 750 were to be reduced ; and a 
large majority of these to a merely nominal amount." 

The bill passed the Commons, amid loud cheering, on 
the 28th of June. 

The woi-king out of this measure occupied Mr. Glad- 
stone nearly the whole of the session, a session thus 
characterised by Miss Martineau, a most competent 
authority : — " There was something really refreshing to 
the country, in the midst of its distresses, in the character 
and action of this session of Parliament. At the be- 
ginning, the Opposition was hostile, saucy, active, and 
united ; and it was curious to see how it changed under 



THE GREAT ADMINISTRATION OP PEEL. 39 

the eye of a Minister who could frame measures first, and 
then carry them. Some of his measures were as un- 
acceptable to classes and parties as any that had been 
brought forward for some years ; yet their progress, from 
their fi.rst conception to their becoming the law of the 
l&nd, was never delayed. The nation saw and felt that 
its business was understood and accomplished, and the 
House of Commons was no longer like a sleeper under 
nightmare. The long session was a busy one. The 
Queen wore a cheerful air when she thanked her Par- 
liament for their effectual labours. The Opposition was 
sacli as could no longer impede the operations of the 
next session. The condition of the country was fearful 
enough ; but something was done for its future improve- 
ment, and the way was now shown to be open for further 
beneficent legislation." 

In 1843, "The Condition of England Question" 
monopolised public attention. "Young England" preaclied 
its specific, Owen and the Socialists theirs ; the Chartists 
maintained that a complete political revolution would 
cure all. Cobden and the League called for free trade in 
corn, while Lord Ashley prayed for a Commission of In- 
quiry into the religious and moral state of the lower 
orders. Mr. Gladstone took a middle course. In justi- 
fication of his vote against Lord Howick's motion for an 
inquiry into the condition of the people, with especial 
reference to the effect of the Corn Laws, he argued that 
one great object of the measure of the preceding year was 
to give a stimulus to trade, symptoms of which already 
appeared, and which he cited with satisfactory variety 
and copiousness. But suppose Lord Howick were to 
gain his Committee, and the Corn Law were to be 



40 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

repealed, by v/hat measure would it be followed, with 
the variety of opinions among Opposition Members ? 
Lord John Russell's fixed duty had met with sorry treat- 
ment from members behind him ; Lord Palmerston ad- 
vocated a mere revenue duty; Mr. Cobden argued against 
such a duty, that an equivalent impost must be laid on 
home corn. If asked why deal with corn on a differeat 
principle from that of dealing with other commodities, 
Mr. Gladstone said that he had a very good temporary 
answer ; he replied, because it had been so dealt with for 
centuries, and enormous investments had been made 
under the faith of such a principle. He still adhered tD 
the opinion which Lord Howick had quoted, respecting 
the importation of 50,000 oxen, that exports would be in- 
creased in a corresponding degree on the relaxation of 
restrictions on imports ; but the application of such a 
proposition must be carefully watched. It was a prin- 
ciple which might be very safe with reference to the im- 
portation of 50,000 head of cattle (for that would not 
produce the displacement of British labour) ; in such a 
case it might be well to trust to the operation of the 
natural laws of exchange between man and man ; but it 
did not follow that the law on which the masses of the 
labour of the country were dependent should be aban^ 
doned. Let them honestly ask themselves this question — 
whether or no they were in a condition to repeal the Corn 
Law without the displacement of a vast mass of labour 1 

He stood up against the "West Indian interest in be- 
half of admitting Brazilian sugar (under the " favoured 
nation " maxim) on the same relatively beneficial terms 
as colonial sugar ; but, with Joseph Sturge and many 
other good men, he objected to the complete equalisation 



THE GREAT ADMINISTRATION OF PEEL. 41 

of the duties, on the plea that such a course would practi- 
cally involve the payment of a premium to slavery and 
the slave trade. 

Gradually the fruits of the wise policy of Peel and 
Gladstone appeared and multiplied. They were admitted 
by all, save T^y the irrepressible band of croakers never 
to be extirpated this side of the millennium. The results 
of the new policy were thus felicitously summarised by 
a young member, now the Right Honourable Edward 
Cardwell, in his speech when seconding the Address in 
answer to the Speech from the Throne, in 1844 : — 

" It would be found in all, or nearly all, the great branches of 
British manufacture ; symptoms of returning healtli presented them- 
selves, the same in character, diiferent in degree, but fortunately often 
found in the highest degree, when from the importance of the article 
as a staple manufacture of the kingdom, their presence was the most 
satisfactory and the most encouraging. In regard to cotton, we should 
say that the stimulus which commenced with the low prices of last year 
had steadily maintained itself; that, notwithstanding some increase in 
the price of the raw material, and some (he believed) groundless alarm 
with regard to the prospects of the future crop, and a partial improve- 
ment in the rate of wages, the courage of the producer had been 
sustained ; demand was brisk ; stocks were low ; and all the indica- 
tions of a healthy trade presented themselves." 

Some idea of the change produced by the new policy 
may be gleaned from the simple fact that the deficit of 
the last year of the Melbourne Administration was 
£2,570,000. The surplus in 1844 was £2,700,000. 

Mr. Gladstone was the author of the great Railway 
Bill of 1844, of which we have heard so much within 
the last two or three years, and of which we shall 
hear a great deal more in the years to come. We must 
content ourselves with summarily saying that its chief 



42 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

provisions comprised the legality of Parliament compel- 
ling companies to reduce their fares when their clear 
profits exceeded 1 per cent. ; the compulsory running of 
trains containing seated and covered carriages at least 
once daily at a maximum fare of a penny a mile j and, 
last and most important of all, the assumption by the 
nation of the right to buy all railways constructed sub- 
sequently to the passing of the Act, at a rate amounting 
to twenty-one times the annual revenue, calculated on 
the average of a term of years. 

At the commencement of 1845, to the surprise of all 
and the consternation of many, it was made public that 
Mr. Gladstone had resigned his seat in the Cabinet. 
Some rumoured that the Cabinet was torn by internal 
dissensions, and that Mr. Gladstone's sudden retirement 
was only the prelude to other secessions. The mystery 
was soon explained. On the first night of the session, it 
was solved. Mr. Gladstone had resigned, simply because 
Ministers had resolved to bring in measures for the in- 
crease of the endowment to Maynooth College, and for 
the establishment of non-sectarian colleges in Ireland, in 
which young men of various creeds might obtain the 
advantages of an academic training. Such proposals were 
in direct contravention of the abstract theories of the 
mutual relations of Church and State as propounded in 
Mr. Gladstone's well-known work — a book from whose 
principles and very cardinal dogma it is hardly necessary 
to say that Mr. Gladstone's opinions have since completely 
departed. 

He felt accordingly that it would seem that he was 
clinging to office for the sake of the various advantages 
attendant upon its retention, if he, whose published views 



THE GREAT ADMINISTRATION OP PEEL. 43 

were so well known, remained in the Ministry. But 
here it is desirable to quote his own words. We cite a 
passage which compresses the pith of his speech on the 
night of the opening of the session : — 

" I held it to be my duty, whenever such a measure came before the 
House, to apply my mind to its consideration, f i ee from all biassed or 
selfish considerations, and with the sole and single view of arriving at 
such a conclusion as, upon the whole, the interests of the country and 
the circumstances of the case might seem to demand. ... It Avas 
absolutely due to the public, and due to myself, that I should, so far 
as in me lay, place myself in a position to form an opinion upon a 
matter of so great importance, that should not only be actually free 
from all bias or leaning Avith respect to any considerations whatsoever, 
but an opinion that should be unsuspected. On that account, I have 
taken a course most painful to myself in respect to personal feelings, 
and have separated myself from men with Avhom, and under Avhom, I 
have long acted in public life, and of whom I am bound to say, 
although I have now no longer the honour of serving my most gracious 
Sovereign, that I continue to regard them with unaltered senthnents, 
both of public regard and private attachment. I do feel it to be my 
duty also, at the same moment, distinctly to say, that I am not pre- 
pared to take part in any religious warfare against the measures of my 
right honourable friend." 

Peel at once rose to his feet, and, while confirming 
every word uttered by his disciple, with the grace which 
he knew so well how to display, spoke in the most regret- 
ful terms of the secession, and avowed for his friend, on 
public grounds, "an admiration only equalled by regard 
for his private character." Everybody regretted the 
rigidly and austerely conscientious line taken by Mr. 
Gladstone. Nine out of ten said that he was too scru- 
pulous. But recent experience of Whig tenacity of 
office had disposed men to value even an undue delicacy. 
Meanwhile, Mr. Gladstone's personal views were thoroughly 
with the Ministers, and, as a private member, he warmly 



44 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

supported both their proposals. Thus, on the Maynooth 
question, while supporting the measure, he thought it 
incomplete and unjust in certain of its reservations. He 
thought it advisable that the E-oman Catholic bishops of 
Ireland should be consulted on the subject. He thought 
that considerable weight ought to be attached to the 
judgment of the Koman Catholic bishops on the adjust- 
ment of the principles and details of the measure. He 
further urged the restoration of direct diplomatic corre- 
spondence with the court of Kome. While defending the 
system of religious education enforced at Oxford from the 
attacks and sneers which had been made upon it, he pro- 
ceeded to contend that the system of mixed education 
adopted in University College, London, was much fitter 
for Ireland than it was for England ; for the dangers of 
it were more likely to be experienced in England, where 
religious discipline was lax, than in Ireland, where, from 
the influence of the Koman Catholic religion, the religious 
discipline exercised over each individual of that persuasion 
was personally strict. 

He then justified the principles and details of the 
measure ; and, in so doing, entered his emphatic protest 
against the declaration of Sir Robert Inglis, that it was 
"a gigantic scheme of godless education." The bill con- 
tained a provision for religious education, so far as it was 
safe to do so ; for it provided rooms in each of these 
colleges for theological lectures, which was an explicit 
admission of the efficacy of religious education. Nay, 
more, it provided facilities for the voluntary payment of 
professors to deliver such lectures. He concluded by coun- 
selling both parties to lay aside their prejudices, and give to 
the subject a careful, and even a tender consideration. 



THE GREAT ADMINISTRATION OF PEEL. 45 

On a subsequent occasion he supported the measures 
on the ground that, whatever gave ease and comfort 
to the Professors of the College of Maynooth, would 
tend to soothe and soften the tone of the College itself. 
He found arguments in favour of the endowment in 
the great numbers and poverty of the Roman Catholic 
people of Ireland, in the difiaculty they experienced in 
providing for themselves the necessaries of life, and in 
the still greater difficulty which they found in providing 
for themselves preachers of their own faith, and in 
procuring means of education for them. He found addi- 
tional arguments in the inclination to support it exhibited 
by all the great statesmen on both sides of the House, 
and in the fact that those who paid the taxes of a country 
had a right to share in the benefits of its institutions. 
Nothing convinced him so much of the validity of the 
arguments in support of this measure as the paucity and 
weakness of those urged against it by its opponents. 
They said that this experiment of Maynooth was an 
experiment of Mr. Pitt, and that it had been fairly 
tried, and had signally failed. But they forgot that the 
original view of Mr. Pitt was, that the Ptoman Catholic 
clergy of Ireland should not only be trained in the 
College of Maynooth, but that they should also have a 
subsequent provision made for their support. No such 
provision had been made j and it was most unjust to say 
that Mr. Pitt's experiment had failed, when, in point of 
fact, it had only been partially tried. 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE ADMINISTRATION OP LORD JOHN RUSSELL. 

The great year of the enactment of the Repeal of the 
Corn Laws is a blank as far as Mr. Gladstone is con- 
cerned. That is to say, it is so in one sense. He took 
his full share in the responsibility of the measure. As 
has been seen, he resigned his position as President of 
the Board of Trade early in 1845, and he remained out 
of office during the major portion of that year; giving 
the while a loyal independent support to his former col- 
leagues. It was in the last days of the year that Sir 
Robert Peel, who appears by his own published and 
authorised Memoirs to have meditated the step for some 
time, announced to his colleagues in the Cabinet that 
he had finally made up his mind that the Corn Laws 
must be given up. The result was that he submitted his 
own and his fellow-Ministers' resignations to Her 
Majesty. He recommended to the Crown that Lord 
John Russell, the leader of the Opposition, whose famous 
"Edinburgh Letter," advocating repeal, had appeared 
in the previous month of November, should be sent for. 
Lord John failed to form a Ministry, owing to the 
determined refusal of Earl Grey to take office in the same 
Cabinet with Lord Palmerston, whose views on foreign 
policy he disapproved. Peel was again sent for, and in 



THE ADMINISTRATION OP LORD JOHN RUSSELL. 47 

a few days his Cabinet was reconstituted, the same peers 
and gentlemen who had served under him before return- 
ing to their former posts, with only two exceptions. 
The place of Lord Wharncliffe, who had been removed 
during the crisis by death, was supplied by the Duke 
of Buccleugh ; and a vacancy was created at the head of 
the Colonial Office by the refusal of Lord Stanley, who 
had occupied that office, to identify himself with Sir 
Robert's new policy. The Secretaryship for the Colonies 
was offered to Mr. Gladstone, and he accepted it, thereby 
definitely identifying his convictions and his future with 
the policy of Corn Law Kepeal. Yet he did not utter 
one word in support of the measure. During the whole 
of 1846 he suffered from ill health, and was absent 
from his place in the House. At least, if he were 
present, he never spoke, and his name does not once 
occur in any page of any volume of Hansard for the 
whole year 1846. He resigned office with his colleagues 
when Peel finally retired from power in the summer of 
1846, and Lord John Russell, for the first time, was 
elevated to the position of Premier; and he remained 
on the benches of the Opposition until, six years later, 
he became Chancellor of the Exchequer under the Earl 
of Aberdeen in 1 852. 

His throwing in his lot with the Free-traders cost 
Mr. Gladstone his seat for Newark. He received an inti- 
mation from the virtual proprietor of that seat, the Duke 
of Newcastle, that his support was withdrawn from him. 
He was at once started, however, as a candidate, by a 
large and influential body of members of his university, 
for that Parliamentary blue ribbon, the representa- 
tion of the University of Oxford. The contest was a 



48 WILLIAM EWAUT GLADSTONE. 

remarkably keen one. The crucial point of controversy 
in very many of the constituencies in the election of 
1847 was the Maynooth question. Many distinguished 
men, the most conspicuous being Mr. Macaulay, who 
was thrown out for Edinburgh, lost their seats in conse- 
quence of their votes two years previously for an increase 
in the grant to Maynooth, and its transference from 
the annual votes to the Consolidated Fund. Candidates 
were labelled, not only Conservative and Liberal, but 
"Protestant." The issue at Oxford depended entirely 
upon this. There were three candidates. Sir Robert 
Harry Inglis, whose seat was not disputed ; Mr. Glad- 
stone, and a Mr. Round, an obscurity who had already, 
like Mr. Gladstone, sat in Parliament for an urban 
constituency ; and whose only claim on the consideration 
of his fellow-members of Convocation was the fact of his 
strong anti- Maynooth convictions and votes. Excepting, 
perhaps, the City of London, no contest was watched 
with such intense interest as that for Oxford. It was 
made a matter of general national speculation. Im- 
mense efforts were made on both sides. In his address 
to the electors, Mr. Gladstone thus defined and justified 
the line he had adopted : — 

" However willing I had been upon, and for many years after, my 
introduction to Parliament, to struggle for the exclusive support of " 
the national religion by the State, and to resist all arguments drawn 
from certain inherited arrangements in favour of a more relaxed 
system, I found that scarcely a year passed without the fresh adoption 
of some measure involving the national recognition, and the national 
support, of various forms of religion, and in particular that a recent , 
and fresh provision had been made for the propagation from a public 
chair of Arian or Socinian doctrines. The question remaining for me 
was, whether, aware of the opposition of the English people, I should 
set down as ec|,ual to nothing, in a matter primarily connected not with 



THE ADMINISTRATION OF LOUD JOHN IIUSSELL. 4 'J 

our but with their priesthood, the wishes of the people of Irehind ; 
aud whether I should avail myself of the popular feeliug iu regard to 
the Roman Catholics for the purpose of enforciug agaiust them a 
system whicli we had ceased by commou consent to enforce against 
Ariaus — a system, above all, of which I must say that it never can be 
conformable to policy, to justice, or even to decency, when it has 
become avowedly partial and one-sided in its application." 

As specimens of the comments which were elicited 
by the contest, the following may be taken. The Times 
wrote : — '* It (Exeter Hall) chooses a candidate with the 
stature of a pigmy, and then brings all opponents down 
to his level ;" and, at greater length, it recommended the 
claims of Mr. Gladstone : — " Mr. Gladstone promises at 
least better tiling's. His earnest attachment to the 
Chui'ch is undoubted. He has the advantage of being a 
man of distinguished talent and industry, who can work, 
think, and make himself listened to. And he has ob- 
viously asked himself not merely, ' What shall I say for 
the Church]' but the more important questions, 'What 
can be done for her I — what can she safely stand 1 Look- 
ing at the aotual state of England, and the probable 
course of national convictions, what are the political 
relations which she can occupy with the greatest and most 
lasting advantage to herself?' The consequence has been 
that Mr. Gladstone has relaxed in the exclusiveness of 
his politico-ecclesiastical principles. He has admitted 
to himself — not certainly before it was necessary — the 
fact that the nation is not the Church, nor Parliament 
an assembly of Churchmen. He no longer calls on the 
Legislature to ignore all forms of religion but those 
established by law, or exactly coincident with his own 
belief; and thus, creating no exceptional proscription for 
Koman Catholics, ho lias voted for an increased grant to 

D 



50 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

Maynootli. Meanwhile, lie seems to be wisely endeavour- 
ing to retrieve these apparent losses by urging, with 
increasing anxiety, the internal development of the 
Church, and the removal of such obstacles to that 
development as the habits or principles of other days 
may have left behind them. We think him so far right. 
His admissions are due to the nation whose affairs he 
has been already called to administer — his exertions to 
the Church, of which he is a member. His election, 
unlike that of Mr. Round, while it sends an important 
member to the House of Commons, will certainly be 
creditable, and may be valuable to the University ; and 
we heartily hope that no negligence or hesitation among 
his supporters may impede his success." 

The Beverend F. T>. Maurice published a pamphlet 
on the subject, in which, pleading for toleration, he 
pungently wrote : — "Protestantism will be regarded as 
the same thing with Protestant ascendancy; a belief in 
the Nicene Creed, with an opinion about a certain way 
of treating the property of Unitarians." Mr. Gladstone 
was proposed in a speech of admirable Latinity by Dr. 
Eichards, Rector of Exeter, the only Head of a House 
who voted for him. Sir Robert Peel came and plumped 
for him, immediately after he had secured his own 
election for Tamworth. The result was, that while Sir 
Robert Inglis came in at the head of the poll with a very 
large majority, Mr. Gladstone came in second, with 997, 
and Mr. Round was defeated, with 824 votes. 

The cause of Free Trade was largely advanced in 
the two or three years immediately succeeding Mr. 
Gladstone's return for Oxford. He took a leading part 
in supporting all the measures of fiscal relaxation with 



THE ADMINISTRATION OF LORD JOHN RUSSELL. 51 

which the name of Mr. Labouchere, the Whig President of 
the Board of Trade, remains chiefly identified. He gave 
also an independent support to Government on those 
details of Irish policy which the dire distress and discon- 
tent across St. George's Channel rendered necessary — the 
loan of £16,000,000 for railways, the large advances to 
landlords for improvements, the establishment of the 
Encumbered Estates Court, and the furnishing to the 
Lord-Lieutenant powers of a dictatorial character for the 
suppression of all rebellious movements. In 1848, he 
thus concluded a very efiective reply to a diatribe of 
Lord George Bentinck against the policy which he had 
done so much to establish : — 

*' When tlie noble lord alluded to the importation of foreign 
goods into this country, he was accustomed to compute the number of 
individuals to whom the manufacture of such goods would give 
Employment in this country. The noble lord laid great stress and 
emphasis on this announcement, and would have a portion of the 
House believe that, if foreign goods were not imported, some additional 
thousands of British persons would be employed in the manufacture 
of sucli articles. For instance, to adopt an illustration of the noble 
lord, he said, if the half-million in value of foreign silk goods which 
had been imported into this country since the commencement of the 
year had not been received, upwards of 64,000 persons would have 
been employed, but he did not say for how long. [Lord George 
Bentinck : For a year.] He thought it was rather dangerous to 
adopt sucb an estimate. It was rather hard to say that half a million 
sterling would support with wages 64,000 persons for the year. He 
could not doubt for one moment but that he could expose the fallacy 
as to the advantage of all goods being produced at home ; for what 
had been said with respect to silk goods would apply to all kinds of 
goods. He would take, for instance, the wines of France ; no one 
could doubt that they could be obtained from grapes produced in 
a multiplicity of hothouses. So again, sugar, which we now obtain 
from the tropics, might be produced by means of stores and furnaces ; 
and how many millions of persons would be employed by resorting to 

D 'J 



52 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

such, a course ? The fallacy was so gross that it was hardly possible to 
deal with it in a serious manner. Why, they could not go along the 
river or the streets without the absurdity of such a notion being 
forcibly imposed upon their minds. He did not know whether the noble 
lord in the course of his commercial peregrinations ever passed up or 
down the river, for if he had he must have seen the number of steamers 
which were constantly conveying large numbers of the labouring classes 
at the lowest fares from the City to Lambeth. One of these steamers 
probably afforded employment to five or six persons, and it might 
convey a thousand passengers in the course of an afternoon. The 
noble lord would, according to his own statement, have good ground 
for considering how many watermen it would require to convey this 
number of passengers, and who might thus be employed. He might 
say that each such boat might give employment to a hundred Avater- 
men, and might add, this was the way in which they robbed English- 
men of the produce of their labour. He hoped the noble lord, for the 
future, would be cautious as to adopting this mode of argument. He 
did not anticipate any great mischief would result from what had 
fallen from the noble lord. He thought that there was a bit in the 
mouth of the noble lord — if he might use such an expression without 
offence — and of course he only applied the expression to the noble 
lord's opinions on commercial subjects. He did not think that the 
opinions of the noble lord would make way ; but if unhappily they 
should make way, and the Houses of Pai'liament should be induced to 
listen to the plans of the noble Lord, he feared their proceedings would 
not receive a check until they had brought disgrace and ruin on the 
country." 

In continuance of tlie clear line which he had already- 
taken on the Maynooth question, he advocated in this 
Parliament the establishment of direct diplomatic rela- 
tions with the Court of Bome. It was all very well, he 
urged, that they should be suspended for a period of a 
century after the Keformation, for which period the 
Papal See was absolutely and formally in a state of war 
Avith England. Now that the danger and affront were 
removed, why continue the prohibition ? He maintained, 
further, that the indirect and underhand mode which we 



THE ADMIN ISTIIATION OF LOUD JOHN RUSSELL. 53 

adopted of commiuiicating with the Papacy was "not 
altogether compatible with the frankness and ingenu- 
ousness of the English character." With rare, and, as 
some thought, indiscreet frankness, he dwelt upon the 
convenience of having direct and respectful communica- 
tion with the Pope about the affairs of Ireland, in which 
the educational and other interests of our Catholic 
fellow-subjects were concerned. It would have been 
much better if we could have had direct communication 
with Rome in the case of the establishment of the 
Queen's Colleges in Ireland. He held it to be wrong to 
establish educational institutions of any character for the 
behoof of Catholics, without consulting the head of their 
faith. For to take counsel, as had been done, with the 
Irish Catholic prelates, was as if the commander of one 
force in time of war were to enter into negotiations 
with the sergeants and corporals of the 0])posing host. 

No subject was made so completely his own by Mr. 
Gladstone, during the first half of the Administration of 
Lord John Russell, as the Navigation Laws. He sup- 
ported the successive proposals for their repeal, although 
on grounds differing somewhat from those taken by the 
Ministry. Thus, in 1848, when the measure was first 
introduced, he made an able and comprehensive speech 
on the whole subject, taking a view not exactly in ac- 
cordance with the sentiments of either party in the 
debate. The broad question of repeal, as a matter of 
expediency and reasonableness, he decided in the afiirma- 
tive; but on the specific Government scheme he ex- 
pressed a qualified opinion. He should have preferred 
a more gradual measure. He wished that the Govern- 
ment had adhered to the usual traditional course of 



54 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

precedents, and made large concessions conditional upon 
reciprocal concessions by other Powers. He objected to 
the discretionary power proposed to be lodged in the 
Queen in Council, with a view of extorting reciprocity, 
which was a discretion too large and too delicate ; and 
he thought the Government would have acted more 
safely and wisely by undoing fiscal restrictions piecemeal, 
rather than by introducing a measure of so sweeping a 
character. He censured the policy of excluding the 
coasting trade from this measure : we should have offered 
to admit the Americans to our coasting trade if they 
would admit us to theirs. 

The Whigs, who had introduced their bill late in 
the session of 1848, were compelled to withdraw it, but 
re-introduced it in the year following, and carried it, 
after peculiarly protracted struggles, to a successful issue. 
In an elaborate speech, the last delivered by Mr. Glad- 
stone on the subject, he finally expounded and justified 
his scheme of conditional relaxation, which, nevertheless, 
for reasons given below, he said he would not, as he 
had intended, press to a division. Had he been prepared, 
he said, to trouble the House with an amendment, he 
would have proposed a clause for conditional legislation, 
and several clauses involving legislative provisions of a 
direct character. His plan would have been to divide 
the whole maritime trade of the country into two classi- 
fications — ^first, that which related to our trade with 
foreign countries; and secondly, that which related to 
our domestic trade, including the coastwise and the 
colonial. He would then have proposed, that when any 
country was disposed to give a perfect freedom to 
British ships in regard to its foreign trade, it should 



!..* 



THE ADMINISTRATION OF LORD JOHN RUSSELL. 55 

receive in return a perfect freedom in regard to our 
foreign trade ; and that, when it was disposed to give us 
a perfect freedom in regard to all its maritime trade, it 
should enjoy the same, so far as our maritime trade was 
concerned, foreign and domestic, including in the latter 
the colonial and coasting trade. He would then have 
asked the House to deal with the colonial trade, irre- 
spective of what foreign nations might be inclined to do 
in the matter. He would also have proposed a clause 
respecting the importation of tropical produce, after 
which he would have submitted a provision absolutely 
repealing every restraint, in the nature of a tax, on the 
British shipowner. Such, he continued, had been the 
outline of a plan which at one time it had been his inten- 
tion to propose ; and he then proceeded to explain to the 
House why it was that he had abandoned that intention. 

It was his wish to see the Navigation Laws repealed, 
but repealed in a manner which would have prevented 
any serious shock to the great interests involved. But 
it was evidently the resolution of the shipowners to 
stand at all hazards by the present law, or to permit but 
few and inconsiderable alterations in it. He could not, 
therefore, look for any support from them, if he submitted 
his proposition to the House. Nor had he, until that 
moment, entirely abandoned the hope that the Govern- 
ment might have introduced some modifications into 
their measure, which would to some extent have met the 
views which he had ventured to submit on the second 
reading of the bill. But this, it was now evident, they 
were not disposed to do. Both the Government and the 
party representing the views of the shipowners seemed 
to prefer a decisive course upon the whole question ; and, 



56 WILLIAM EWAllT GLADSTONE. 

as his intention had never been to propose any plan for 
the mere purpose of obstruction, he thought that it 
would not now conduce to the public advantage if, by 
submitting his j^lan, he wasted the time of the House in 
fruitless discussions. As the issue, then, to which the 
matter had been brought was between the continuance 
of the present law and its unconditional repeal, he would 
not be responsible for any course which might result in 
retarding the repeal of the lav/, preferring, as he did, the 
plan of the Government, with all its defects, to the 
continuance of the present system. 

A somewhat noteworthy feature of the discussion 
which followed was a very caustic speech of Mr. 
Disraeli, in which he adequately represented the chagrin 
of ther Protectionists at the disappointment of their 
expectation to have used Mr. Gladstone as a means of 
defeating the bill in toto. He declared his entire inability 
to comprehend his rival's conduct. Mr. Gladstone, in 
terms at once spirited and temperate, vindicated his 
consistency. He knew, he said, that if he had pressed 
his amendment, he should have been supported at first, in 
the early stages of the contest, by the Protectionist body, 
but not with a bond fide acceptance of his proposition. 
He knew very well that the wish was merely to make a 
tool of him against a plan, of the general objects of which 
he approved, and then to abandon him on the third 
reading of the bill. He added a few sentences of comment 
on certain observations made by Mr. Disraeli as to the 
evil effects of Free Trade, maintaining that it was to Free 
Trade, under the mercy of God, it was mainly owing that 
the distress which the country had lately suffered had 
not been much greater. 



THE AD3I1NISTRATI0N OF LOUD JOUN EUSSELL. [) t 

After very fierce and oft-renewed struggles in both 
Houses, this important bill received the final sanction of 
Parliament, its operation being fixed to commence on the 
1st of January, 1850. Mr. Gladstone's position was 
very considerably advanced b}'^ the independent and 
prominent line which he had taken at all stages of 
its discussion. The progress of the debates on this 
measure had brought Gladstone and Disraeli into closer 
and closer relations of rivalry, and some people began to 
speculate as to which should be the future leader of the 
Tory party; although already others, of clearer vision, 
predicted Mr. Gladstone's absorption in the Liberal 
ranks. 

Yet there remained not a few points of importance 
in which a certain identity of view with Toryism of the 
truest type continued to characterise Mr. Gladstone. 
Thus, he made the most elaborate speeches on more than 
one occasion in. justification of the votes which he, session 
after session, recorded against the admission of JewA 
into Parliament; and he continued to advocate a favour- 
able line of policy towards the West India planters, which 
was in its very essence Protectionist. When the move- 
ment arose for granting the rights of constitutional self- 
government to the colonies, Sir William Molesworth 
and others, whose names are chiefly associated with that 
movement, found in Mr. Gladstone a most ready and 
willing supporter. In his own words, he summarised 
the whole case in the phrase, " Emancipation of the 
Colonies from home control, as far as is consistent with 
imperial interests." He expressed especial abhorrence 
of the system of making the heads of departments in the 
Colonial Office the practical administrators and rulers of 



58 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

our dependencies, and emphatically urged our getting 
rid of the machinery of an administrative department 
which " had of necessity worked in a way to cause pain- 
ful disputes." He supported aW the measures of the 
Whigs for establishing local legislative assemblies in 
our Antipodean and American colonies, and endeavoured, 
with the assistance of Mr. Walpole, Sir "William Page 
Wood, and Sir Koundell Palmer, but without success, 
to legalise independent synodal action by the bishops, 
clergy, and laity of the Anglican communion in the 
colonies. 

When Mr, Disraeli brought forward his great motion 
for an inquiry into agricultural distress, in 1850, Mr. 
Gladstone ranged himself amongst his supporters. Mr. 
Pisraeli moved for a committee of the whole House, to 
consider such a remission of the rural poor-rates, and 
the imposition of a portion of them on the Consolidated 
Fund, as would mitigate the prevailing distress. Mr. 
Gladstone expressed himself ready to go into the con- 
sideration of the question raised by Mr. Disraeli's 
motion. So far from believing, as some members of the 
Government had held, that the motion menaced a return 
to Protection, he thought it had a tendency to weaken 
the arguments in favour of a retrograde policy, and to 
draw off the moderate Protectionists. He voted for the 
motion on the same ground that Sir James Graham 
voted against it — the ground of justice. It was impossi- 
ble to look at the poor-rate without being struck by the 
inequality of its incidence. The rate was levied locally 
—first, for the purposes of policy connected with the 
poor ; and, secondly, for the discharge of a sacred 
obligation imposed b^ religion; but this was an old 



THE ADMINISTRATION OP LORD JOHN RUSSELL. 59 

obligation which applied to the community at large. As 
an abstract proposition, the rate should fall upon all 
descriptions of property : this might be impracticable, 
but the objection of impracticability did not apply to the 
proposition before the House. It had been said that 
landed property came by inheritance charged with this 
bufden ; but the burden was accompanied by a system 
of protection which gave produce an artificial value, 
contrary, indeed, to abstract justice, but not more so 
than the inequality of the rate. He was thoroughly 
convinced that it was the farmers and the independent 
yeomen, rather than the landlords, who would benefit 
by the change. Even if the whole benefit, after a time, 
should be reaped by the landlords, that fact in itself 
would not be a fatal objection. 

The motion was negatived, by a majority of twenty- 
one, in a House of 525 Members. Mr. Gladstone was 
' one of the minority. 

The famous and now historical debate of 1850, in 
which the whole foreign policy of Lord Palmerston and 
the Whigs was so fiercely assailed, gave to Mr. Gladstone 
an opportunity of making by far the most considerable 
speech, at once in respect of magnitude and power, to 
which he had yet given utterance. "With all the other 
followers of Peel, he was ranged against the Foreign 
Secretary. He spoke for several hours on the third 
night of the debate, and thus concluded a speech worthy 
to rank with those of Palmerston, Graham, Cobden, and 
Cockburn in the same debate — than which higher praise 
cannot be given : — 

" There is a further appeal from this House of Parliament to the 
people of England; but, lastly, there is also an appeal from the 



60 WILLIAM EWART GL.VDSTONE. 

people of England to tlie general sentiment of the civilised world ; and 
I, for my part, am of opinion that England will stand shorn of a chief 
part of her glory and her pride if she shall be found to have separated 
herself, through the policy she pursues abroad, from the moral supports 
which the general and fixed convictions of mankind afford — if the day 
shall come in which she may continue to excite the wonder and the 
fear of other nations, but in which she shall have no part in their 
affection and their regard. 

" No, sir, let it not be so : let us recognise, and recognise with 
frankness, the equality of the weak Avith the strong ; the principles of 
brotherhood among nations, and of their sacred independence. When 
we are asking for the maintenance of the rights which belong to our 
fellow-subjects resident in Greece, let us do as we would be done by, 
and let us pay all the respect to a feeble State, and to the infancy of 
free institutions, which we should desire and exact from others towards 
their maturity and their strength. Let us refrain from all gratuitous 
and arbitrary meddling in the internal concerns of other States, even 
as we should resent the same interference if it were attempted to be 
practised towards ourselves. If the noble lord has indeed acted on 
these principles, let the Government to which he belongs have your 
verdict in its favour ; but if he has departed from them, as I contend, 
then the House of Commons .must not shrink from the performance of 
its duty, under whatever expectations of momentary obloquy or 
reproach, because we shall have done what is right ; we shall enjoy 
the peace of our own conscience ; and receive, whether sooner or a 
little later, the approval of the public voice, for having entered our 
solemn protest against a system of policy which we believe — nay, 
which we know — whatever may be its first aspect, must of necessity in 
its final result be unfavourable even to the security of British subjects 
resident abroad, which it professes so much to study — unfavourable to 
tlie dignity of the country, which the members of the House of Lords 
may assert that it preserves — and equally unfavourable to that other 
great and sacred object which also it suggests to our recollection, the 
maintenance of peace with the nations of the world." 



CHAPTER V. 

FINAL ABANDONMENT OF TORYISM. 

Two mouths after the close of the session of I80O, the 
nation was startled as if by the news of a foreign invasion. 
Pope Pio Nono, who had so recently excited and dis- 
appointed the hopes of European liberalism, issued a brief, 
or rescript, in which he established in England a Roman 
Catholic episcopal hierarchy, parcelling out the whole 
land into territorial dioceses, presided over by twelve 
bishops, and a Cardinal- Archbishop of Westminster. At 
this unprecedented act of what the great majority of the 
nation deemed wanton, unjustifiable " aggression," the 
popular passion was at once most tumultuously excited. 
"When Parliament met in 1851, the " Papal Aggression" 
filled most men's mouths and breasts, superseding even 
the excited expectation of the opening of the Great Exhi- 
bition of the Industry of All Nations, and the general 
talk about the tottering weakness of the Whig Adminis- 
tration. And the immediate form into which the general 
angry fervour crystallised itself was the query, " What 
steps will the Government and the Parliament take, in 
defiance and repulsion of the 'aggression?]" To the 
satisfaction of most, the Queen's Speech contained this 
paragraph : — " The recent assumption o.' certain ecclesi- 
astical titles conferred by a foreign power has excited 



62 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

strong feelings in this country; and large bodies of my 
subjects have presented addresses to me^ expressing attach- 
ment to the Throne, and praying that such assumptions 
should be resisted. I have assured them of my resolution 
to maintain the rights of my crown and the independence 
of the nation against all encroachment, from whatever 
quarter it may proceed. I have, at the same time, ex- 
pressed my earnest desire and firm determination, under 
God's blessing, to maintain unimpaired the religious 
liberty which is so justly prized by the people of this 
country. It will be for you to consider the measure 
which will be laid before you on this subject." 

A few days afterwards Lord John Russell moved for 
leave to introduce a bill for preventing the " assumption 
of any title, not only from any diocese now existing, but 
from any territory or place in any part of the United 
Kingdom, and to restrain parties from obtaining by 
virtue of such titles any control over trust property." 
Mr. Gladstone took no part in the preliminary debate on 
the motion for leave to introduce the bill. 

Meanwhile, ere the final discussion of the measure on 
its merits, a temporary excitement of a minor character 
was interposed by the occurrence of a ministerial crisis. 
The Cabinet daily grew more pitiably feeble. Sir Charles 
Wood introduced, in March, a Budget which was con- 
demned on all sides, especially by reason of its proposal 
to renew the unpopular income tax. Lord John ten- 
dered his resignation. On his recommendation, Lord 
Stanley was sent for. His Lordship failed — first, in an 
attempt to fuse together a Cabinet of Protectionists and 
Peelites; the latf.er — Sir James Graham being their spokes- 
man — refusing to repair the breach which dated from the 



FINAL ABANDONMENT OF TORYISM. 63 

early months of 1846 : he more conspicuously failed in 
his subsequent endeavour to construct a Ministry from 
the ranks of his immediate followers. Then overtures 
were made to effect a coalition between the Whigs and 
the Peelites. Negotiations were entered into between 
Lord John Kussell on the one hand, and Lord Aberdeen 
on the other. They failed — failed only on the Papal 
Aggression question. Sir James Graham, speaking for 
himself and his political associates, stated in the House 
of Commons that they were quite prepared to effect a 
coalition with the Whigs on two out of the three grounds 
proposed to them. One was a thorough adhesion to the 
principles of Pree Trade, and the second, their readiness to 
entertain the question of further Parliamentary Eeform. 
But the negotiation fairly broke down on the Ecclesiastical 
Titles Assumption question, on which all the Peelites 
differed toto ccelo from Ministers. So the Whigs resumed 
their places, and the crisis was at an end. 

Immediately afterwards the all important question 
came on for discussion. Mr. Gladstone delivered a speech 
brimful of ecclesiastical lore, and in which he, with much 
ingenuity, justified the unpopular position which he and 
a small and heterogeneous minority of the House of 
Commons assumed. He said that his vote would be- 

* governed by regard to principles of imperial policy, and 
to the welfare of the entire community, with reference to 
the interests of the Church of England. He believed 
that our constitution was strong enough to resist any 

^ aggression whatever by any Power in the world. The 
Church of England was not in such a position j but the 
power of the Church could not be defended by temporal 
legislation, which had been tried before and utterly failed. 



64: WILLIAM EVVART GLADSTONE. 

If it could be .shown that the Papal authorities had 
interfered witli our temporal aifairs, which was not per- 
mitted to any other religious body, legislation was not 
only just, but called for. Until, hov/ever, that line was 
passed, we had no right to interfere. He admitted that 
the language of the Papal documents was not only un- 
fortunate, but of a vaunting and boastful character, of 
which complaint might justly be made ; but was it just 
to pass a proscribing Act alfecting our Roman Catholic 
fellow-subjects, on account of language for which they 
were not responsible 1 We must look to the substance 
of the Act, and by that stand or fall. If the law of 
nations had been broken, nothing was more disparaging 
to the country than to proceed only by Act of Parliament, 
imposing a penalty. There was nothing to prevent our 
representing the wrong to the party who had done it, 
and demanding redress. The bill, however, was before the 
House, and the question was what to do with a measure 
which no one had said was adequate for the purpose. 

He then went on to point out various deficiencies and 
anomalies in the bill, which, he said, did not defend the 
territorial rights of the Crown; and with respect to 
Homisli aggression, there was a preliminary question — 
whether the rescript of the Pope had a temporal character. 
That the Roman Catholics recognised the Pope as their 
spiritual head, did not justify the withholding one jot of 
religious freedom. It was not enough that bishops were 
appointed by a foreign authority ; it must be shown that 
they were not spiritual officers, but appointed for tem- 
poral purposes. If the appointment of bishops per se was 
a spiritual, not a temporal act, why exempt the Scottish 
bishops? There was no proof, as to any of the details 



FINAL ABANDONMENT OF TORYISM. Co 

of ecclesiastical machinery, that there was any temporal 
character in the rescript distinct from that incidental to 
the disciplinary ari'angements of every religious body, and 
without such proof there was not a shadow of ground for 
the bill. In the forgotten corners of the law might be 
found doctrines of royal supremacy which might make 
this act of the Pope an aggression ; but if we fell back 
upon these doctrines, he protested against their applica- 
tion to one religious body alone. 

He meant to introduce a new and important point, to 
which no previous reference had been made in the course 
of the prolonged debate — namely, the effect which the 
measure would exert upon the two parties into which the 
Romish community was divided. For three hundred years 
the Roman Catholic laity and secular clergy — the mode- 
rate party — had been struggling, with the sanction of the 
British Government, for this very measure, the appoint- 
ment of diocesan bishops, which the extreme party — the 
regulars and cardinals at the court of Rome — ^had been 
all along struggling to resist. The present legislation 
would drive the Roman Catholics back upon the Pope 
and, teasing them with a miniature penal law, would 
alienate and estrange them. 

The general public opinion as to the line taken by Mr. 
Gladstone and his associates — some of them regular, and 
others occasional, allies — on this question, was, as is usual, 
accurately represented by the comments of the Times in 
the speech which we have thus condensed : — 

" We cannot imagine that the party of Sir Robert Peel has improved 
ts position by the part it has adopted in the recent debate ; nor, what- 
ever may be thought of Mr. Gladstone's talents as a debater, do ^vei 
think taat his speech will add much to his reputation as a practical and 

E 



66 ' WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

far-siglited statesman. The elaborate argument by which h© seeks to 
prove that the aggression of the Pope should have been met by nego- 
tiation is, with reference to the position of the Koraan Pontiff, simply 
puerile. The Pope, as a temporal prince, has nothing to lose, and, 
strong in his weakness, can afford to defy our power. As an eccle- 
siastical potentate, he set all on the cast when he issued his rescript. 
Negotiation, though it might have prevented it, could never recall it. 
Besides, Mr. Gladstone was at great pains to show that the Pope is in 
the hands of the ultra party in the Koman Church, the party bitterly 
hostile to this country, and determined in their arrogance and bigotry 
to push matters to every extremity against xis. To be sure, Mr. 
Gladstone has, with great ingenuity, in flat contradiction to his former 
statement, sought to prove that this was the measure, not of the ultra, 
but moderate party at Rome ; but as both these statements cannot be 
true, and as the former is confirmed by the unexceptionable authority of 
Lord Shrewsbury, we take the liberty of adopting it in preference to 
its contradiction, which Mr. Gladstone asserts with equal confidence. 
Mr. Gladstone admits that we have a right to see that the aggression is 
not of a temporal nature, and in the same breath denies our right to 
inquire into the necessity of the new hierarchy ; but is not the fact that 
the new hierarchy is not wanted, for spiritual purposes pregnant proof 
that it is intended to serve some temporal object ? If we are to leave 
to the Roman Catholics unfettered judgment as to what ecclesiastical 
changes they require, and, under the advice of Mr. Gladstone, to re- 
nounce the use of our reason on the subject, what safeguard does he 
leave us against the encroachments of a religion which has ever refused 
to distinguish between temporal and spiritual authority, and always 
employed the second as a means of obtaining the first ? Mr. Gladstone 
admits the arrogance of the brief and the pastoral, but he does not 
admit what is quite as evident as their arrogance — the claim of dominion 
which they put forth in behalf of a Power which has never renounced 
its claim to the feudal sovereignty of England. We ought, he says, to 
meet this arrogance with fresh conciliation, for, if not, we shall unite 
the Roman Catholics against us, and strengthen the hands of the ultra 
party at Rome. Surely, after we have seen the Roman Catholic mem- 
bers putting up their votes to auction for the purpose of revenge, and 
felt in the recent aggression the utmost rancour of the ultra party at 
Rome, but little is left for us to fear. Whatever be Mr. Gladstone's 
merits as an apologist of the Pope, they are not appreciated either by 
the House or the country, neither of which evince the least inclination 



FINAL ABANDONMENT OF TORYISM. 67 

to place themselves under the guidance of statesmen who, regardless of 
the just susceptibilities of the nation, conceal their own lukewarm 
attachment to Protestantism behind the loosely-worn mask of a spurious 
liberality." 

Rather as a specimen of Mr. Gladstone's style at this 
epoch of his public career, than because we deem it neces- 
sary to the further elucidation of the position which he 
took on this exciting question, we present verbatim the 
concluding passage of the oration, in which he thus in- 
geniously and pungently made rejoinder to a somewhat 
clap-trap appeal by Lord John Russell: — 

" The character of England is in our hands. Let us feel the re- 
sponsibility that belongs to us, and let us rely on it, if we make this 
step backwards, it is one we shall have to retrace with pain. We 
cannot turn back the tendencies of the age towards religious liberty. 
It is our business to forward them. To endeavour to turn them back 
is childish, and every effort you may make in that direction will recoil 
upon you with disaster and disgrace. The noble lord at the head of 
the Government appealed to the gentlemen who sit behind me, in the 
names of Hampden and Pym. 1 have great reverence for the names of 
Hampden and Pym, in one portion at least of their political career ; 
because they were persons energetically engaged in resisting oppression. 
But I would rather have heard Hampden and Pym quoted on any other 
subject than one which relates to the mode of legislation, or the policy 
to be adopted in dealing with our Roman Catholic fellow-citizens, 
because, if there was one. blot on their escutcheon, if there was one 
painful — I would almost say odious — feature in the character of tlie 
party of whom they were the most distinguished chiefs, it was the 
bitter and ferocious intolerance which in them became the more power- 
ful because it was directed against the Roman Catholics alone. I would 
appeal in their names to gentlemen who sit on this side of the House, 
If Hampden and Pym were friends of freedom, so were Clarendon and 
Newcastle ; so were the gentlemen who sustained the principle of 
loyalty, while the principle of freedom was sustained by those whose 
names were quoted by the noble lord. If he appeals to you in the 
name of Hampden and Pym, I appeal to you in the name of the great 
men to whom Hallam says, ' we owe the preservation of the throne of 

E 2 



68 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

this ancient monarchy,' in favour of the Roman Catholics. They were 
not always seeking to tighten the chain and deepen the brand. Their 
disposition was to relax the severity of the law, and attract the affections 
of their Roman Catholic fellow-subjects to the constitution, by treating 
them as brethren. I hope my appeal in their name will be equally 
appropriate to the appeal made by the noble lord in the name of 
Hampden and Pym. 

" We are here strong in the consciousness of a strong cause. . . . 
We, the opponents of the bill, are a minority, insignificant in point of 
.numbers. We are more insignificant, because we have no ordinary 
bond of union. What is it that binds us together against you but the 
conviction that we have on our side the principle of justice — the con- 
viction that we shall soon have on our side the course of public opinion. 
Minority as we are, we are sustained in our path by the consciousness 
that we serve both a generous Queen and a generous people, and that 
the generous people will recognise the truth of the facts we present to 
them. But, above all, we are sustained by the sense of justice which 
we feel belongs to the cause we are advocating, and because we are 
determined to follow that bright star of justice beaming from the 
heavens, whithersoever it may lead." 

Without going into the merits of the essential dispute 
involved in the great controversy which gave to the year 
1851 its per^^Har character, so far as the Parliamentary 
arena was concerned, we cannot help remarking the strong 
and noble passion — for it amounted to a passion — for 
freedom, which was displayed all through this memorable 
address. People began to say that Toryism was fast 
losing its hold on the sentiments of the Member for the 
elder University, and that some day or other he must 
openly range himself on the Liberal side. 

Mr. Gladstone uad spent the winter of 1850-51 in 
Naples. "While there, he was induced to make personal 
examination into the condition of the political prisoners 
— victims of the part they had played in the Kevolution 
two years before, and victims of the perfidy of their 



FINAL ABANDONMENT OF TORYISM. 69 

sovereign, who crowded his prisons with the very best 
of his subjects. When he had possessed himself of 
the facts, he issued a pamphlet, which was followed 
by a second supplementary one, in which he revealed 
Avhat he had discovered to sympathetic and indignant 
Christendom. The known character of the writer, as 
well as the fact that he had not as yet displayed any but 
Conservative sympathies, gave to his hrochures a very 
high weight and authority. His word was taken — a 
more obscure man's might have passed unheeded — when 
he stated, as the result of what he had seen with his own 
eyes, or what at least he personally vouched for and was 
prepared to stand by — that the law had been violated by 
sending men to j^rison without even the formality of a 
sham trial ; that a former Prime Minister and the majority 
of a recent Parliament were in prison ; that there were 
in all twenty thousand prisoners for political offences j^ 
and that they were chained together two and two. f Late V\ 
in the session of 1851, Sir De Lacy Evans, in his place in ' 
Parliament, asked of Lord Palmerston a question, the 
gist of which was an inquiry into the accuracy of Mr. 
Gladstone's statements — whether the victims " are suffer- 
ing refinements of barbarity and cruelty unknown in any 
other civilised country ?" In his reply, Lord Palmerston 
used these words : — " It has not been deemed a part of 
the duty of the British Government to make any formal 
representation to the Government of Naples in a matter 
that relates entirely to the internal affairs of that country. 
At the same time I thought it right, seeing that Mr. 
Gladstone — whom I may freely name, though not in 
his capacity of a Member of Parliament — has done him- 
self, as I think, very great honour by the course he 



70 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

pursued at Naples, and by the course he has followed 
since; for I think, when you see an English gentleman 
who goes to pass a winter at Naples, instead of confining 
himself to those amusements that abound in that city ; 
instead of diving into volcanoes and exploring excavated 
cities — ^when we see him going to courts of justice, visiting 
prisons, descending into dungeons, and examining, great 
numbers of the cases of unfortunate victims of illegality and 
injustice, with a view afterwards to enlist public opinion 
in the endeavour to remedy these abuses — I think that is 
a course that does honour to the person who pursues it." 

Lord Palmerston went on to say tliat he had sent 
copies of Mr. Gladstone's pamphlet to every English 
ambassador, with an injunction that, in the interests 
of humanity, they should bring them under the notice of 
the Courts to which they were severally accredited. 
This statement was most enthusiastically cheered. The 
importance of these productions of Mr. Gladstone's heart 
and pen can hardly be exaggerated. They did very 
much to arouse and intensify the sympathy of all classes ;>-' 
of English society for long-sufiering Italy, i They did 
not a little to pave the way for what Cavour, Garibaldi, 
Napoleon, and Bismark afterwards effected or were the 
means of effecting. As regarded their author personally, 
they did much to restore the popularity which he had 
largely diminished by the unpopular line he had taken 
on the Papal aggression dispute. 

The year 1852 was, in one or two respects, a memor- 
able year — memorable, if for nothing else than this, that , 
within its compass of twelve months it saw three distinct 
statesmen — Lords John Russell, Derby, and Aberdeen — 
occupying in succession the post of Premier. 



FINAL ABANDONMENT OP TORYISM. 71 

Late in 1851, Lord Palmerston was expelled by Lord 
John Russell from the Foreign Office. Early in 1852, 
he revenged himself by concocting with the Tories a 
defeat of Ministers. Lord John Kussell resigned, and 
Lord Derby became Premier. Mr. Gladstone was 
offered (so, at least, the most competent authorities 
allege) a seat in the new Administration ; but definitely 
declined it, thus decisively abjuring his connection with 
the Tories as a party, and indicating that by some other 
ladder than theirs he chose to rise to higher altitudes 
than he had yet attained. Lord Derby's Administration 
was short-lived, and Mr. Gladstone did more than any 
other man to bring about its destruction. The an- 
tagonism and rivalry between Gladstone and Disraeli, 
which had been growing ever since the death of Peel, 
became in this year most conspicuous, and Gladstone 
sought out every occasion of daring an encounter. 
Early in the session, Mr. Gladstone divided the House 
on the proposal of the Government to bestow the seats 
vacated by the disfranchisement of Sudbury and St. 
Albans for bribery, upon the West Riding and South Lan- 
cashire. The question raised by the division really was, 
whether Ministers should content themselves with the 
discharge merely of necessary and routine business, and 
hasten a dissolution, that the country might extort from 
them either a recantation or a re-affirmation of Protectionist 
principles ; and he beat them by a majority of 234 to 148. 

In the course of this session he renewed — with able 
support from like-minded High Churchmen of character, 
such as the great lawyers, Koundell Palmer and Page 
Wood, but without success — his attempt to bestow poweis 
of self-government upon the branches of tlie Church of 



72 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

England in the colonies, which have never yet been 
enjoyed by their mother at home. In the course of the 
discussion on Mr. Spooner's annual anti-Maynooth 
motion, he used these remarkable words — ^remarkable 
when viewed in the light of the events of 1868 : — " If 
the (Maynooth) endowment were withdrawn, the Parlia- 
ment which withdrew it must be prepared to enter upon 
the whole subject of the reconstruction of the ecclesias- 
tical arrangements in Ireland." It is noteworthy that 
this significant utterance was received with loud cheers. 
For his part at least, Sir Robert Inglis said he interpreted 
the cheers as meaning that their utterers understood 
Mr. Gladstone's expression, " re-construction," to signify 
"further confiscation of the property of the Irish Church." 

On the assembling of the new Parliament, Mr. 
Villiers at once put on the notice paper a resolution, the 
practical effect of which was to compel Ministers to 
accept, ex animo, the Free Trade shibboleth; and the 
dose was offered to their lips in a very bitter and un- 
palatable form. Lord Palmerston came to the rescue, 
with a resolution couched in more mild and acceptable 
terms. Mr. Gladstone gave his support to the peace- 
maker. Ministers accepted Lord Palmerston*s amended 
resolution, which was carried. 

In 1852, the Duke of "Wellington passed away, full 
of honours as of years. Of all the Parliamentary eulo- 
giums passed upon his memory, we doubt if any, save 
Lord Derby's, equalled — ^we know of none that excelled 
— Mr. Gladstone's. 

" It may never be given to anotlier subject of the British Crown," he 
said, "to perform services so brilliant as he performed ; it may never be 
given to another man to hold the sword which was to gain independence 



FINAL ABANDONMENT OF TORYISM. 73 

for Europe ; to rally the nations around it, and while England saved 
herself by her constancy, to save Europe by her example ; it may never 
be given to another man, after having attained such eminence, after an 
unexampled series of victories, to show equal modei'ation in peace as 
he had shown greatness in war, and to devote the remainder of his 
life to the cause of internal and external peace for that country which 
he had so served; it may never be given to another man to have 
equal authority, both with the Sovereign he served and with the Senate 
of which he was to. the end a venerated member; it may never be 
given to another man, after such a career, to preserve even to the last 
the full possession of those great faculties with which he was endowed, 
and to carry on the services of one of the most important depart- 
ments of the State with unexampled regularity and success, even to 
the latest day of his life. These are circumstances — these are qualities 
which may never again occur in the history of this country. But 
there are qualities which the Duke of Wellington displayed, of which 
we may all act in humble imitation — that sincere and unceasing 
devotion to our country, that honest and upright determination to act 
for the benefit of the country on every occasion ; that devoted loyalty 
which, while it made him ever anxious to serve the Crown, never 
induced him to conceal from the Sovereign that which he believed to 
be the truth ; that devotedness in the constant performance of his 
duty ; that temperance of his life, which enabled him at all times to 
give his mind and his faculties to the services which he was called 
upon to perform ; that regular, consistent, and unceasing piety by 
which he was distinguished at all times in his life — these are qualities 
that are attainable by others, and these are qualities which should not 
be lost as an example." 

The final fight between Ministers and their opponents 
Kcame ofi" on the Financial Statement. Mr. Disraeli 
proposed to remit one-half of the Malt Tax, to effect a 
considerable re-adjustment of the Income Tax, to extend 
its incidence to natives of Ireland receiving salaries or 
dividends from the Public Funds, but exempting land- 
owners and tenant farmers ; and, lastly, to bring houses 
rented as low as XI within the operation of the House 
Tax, which Sir Charles Wood had substituted (with a 



74 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

£20 limit) for the odious Window Tax. Mr. Gladstone 
led the attack upon this most unpopular, and, as the best 
authorities held, most ill-conceived and vulnerable mea- 
sure. Much heat was evoked in the discussion, as these 
sentences, extracted from one of Mr. Gladstone's speeches 
on the Budget, sufficiently prove : — " We are accustomed 
to attach to the words of the Ministers of the Crown a 
great authority ; and that authority, as it is required by 
the public interest, so it is usually justified by the 
character and conduct of Ministers. But the right 
hon. gentleman is not entitled to charge with insolence 
men who — I must tell him that he is not entitled to say 
to my right hon. friend (Sir J. Graham) that he 
regards, but does not respect him. I must tell the 
right hon. gentleman, that whatever he has learned, 
he has not learned the limits of discretion, of moderation, 
and forbearance, that ought to restrain the conduct and 
language of every member of this House — the disregard 
of which would be an offence in the meanest among us, 
and which is an offence of tenfold weight in the leader 
of the House of Commons." And he thus summed up 
the plain grounds of his objections to the measure on its 
merits : — *' He voted against the Budget, not only be- 
cause he disapproved, on general grounds, of its princi- 
ples, but emphatically, because it was his firm conviction 
that this was the most perverted Budget in its tendency 
and ultimate effects he had ever seen ; and if the House 
should sanction its delusive scheme, the day would come 
when it would look back with bitter and late, though 
ineffectual repentance." 

The Tories immediately resigned, and in a few days 
Mr. Gladstone held Mr. Disraeli's office. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE ADMINISTRATION OF LORD ABERDEEN. 

The prominent — indeed the leading — part which Mr. 
Gladstone had taken in the overthrow of the Administra- 
tion of Lord Derby, naturally designated him for high 
office in that which succeeded it. And the circumstance 
that it was on most important questions of finance that 
he had gained his triumph, coupled with his previous 
experience at the Board of Trade, as appropriately pointed 
out the post of Chancellor of the Exchequer as that most 

'^ fitted for his occupancy. Ere the prorogation of Par- 
liament, late in December of 1852, Lord Aberdeen, 
speaking for himself and his colleagues in the Coalition 
Ministry of which he was the head, with sufficient clear- 
ness indicated the principle on which the fusion of the 
Peelite section of the Tories and the Whigs had been 
established. He expressed his conviction that no Govern- 
tnent was possible in the existing state of parties except 
it were Conservative, nor was any Government possible 
except it were Liberal. These terms had ceased to have 
any definite meaning, except as party cries, and the 

» country was sick of them. The measures, therefore, of 
the Government would be Conservative as well as Liberal ; 
for both were essentially necessary. He looked in vain 
for any indication of what had been alleged by some — the 



76 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

spread of democratic principles ; on the contrary, the 
country at large was never more tranquil or contented ; 
and though there might be speculative democrats among 
us, these were not the men who subverted states. The 
broad features of the programme which the general 
public expected to be submitted to them by the new 
Ministers were thus summarised by an intelligent con- 
temporary journalist : — 

"If it prove, as we trust it will, a wise and reforming, but truly 
Conservative Ministry, it will be supported by the moderate and 
enlightened public, which forms the vast majority of this nation. Such 
a Ministry will have many noble tasks before it. To simplify and 
amend the law, to extend the franchise to unrepresented property, 
intelligence, and good conduct ; to remove impediments from trade and 
industry ; to promote the employment of the people ; to untax cleanli- 
ness, health, and knowledge ; to extend the blessings of education to 
every British child ; to amend our whole system of taxation ; to con- 
ciliate and satisfy our colonies and dependencies ; to promote our 
wholesome and beneficial influence over the greater and lesser nations 
of the v/orld ; to cement and increase a friendly understanding with all 
civilised countries ; to maintain the national honour and dignity in all 
circumstances, great or little ; these are the onerous but honourable 
objects to be attained, and in the prosecution of which an honest 
Ministry, even though its enemies may call it a Coalition, will find 
abundance ®f supporters." 

A few days after taking office, Lord Aberdeen re- 
marked : — " A crisis in our financial arrangements would 
speedily occur by a cessation of a large branch of the 
revenue (the Income Tax), and it would tax the ingenuity 
of all concerned to readjust our finances according to the 
principles of justice and equity." On the 18th of May, 
1853, Mr. Gladstone introduced his first Budget in s 
speech of nearly five hours' duration. And over it he 
spread the equally agreeable announcements of surplus of 
revenue, reduction, and remission of taxation. His chief 



THE ADMINISTRATION OF LORD ABERDEEN. 77 

reduction was a diDiiniition of the duty ou tea from 
2s. 2Jd. a pound to Is., by successive falls, running over 

^ five years ; and the duty on soap, producing £1,100,000, 
he proposed to abolish altogether and at once. These 
great financial strokes were most gladly received, as 
they were at once felt by every household in the king- 
dom. He confessed himself unequal to the equitable 
adjustment of the Income Tax, and instead thereof pro- 
posed to abolish it altogether after a gradual diminution 
running over seven years. The Budget further included 
a reform in the Customs tariff* worthy of being ranked 
with those of Sir Robert Peel. He proposed the reduction 
of the duties on butter, cheese, eggs, fruit, and on many 
other articles of minor importance ; and no less than 133 
tax-paying articles had their duties entirely remitted. 
The assessed taxes — " that stronghold of iniquity which 

> has so long stood the attacks of the genteel sufferers who 
pay them " — ^were also boldly grappled. He proposed the 
reduction of the duties on carriages, private as well as 
hackney, and on horses and dogs, " so that there need be 
no longer a question as to the pedigree of every pet." In 
the stamps also a reform was chalked out. He proposed, 
the abolition of the receipt stamp, a Queen's-head to frank 

I ja receipt as it did a letter. The stamp duty on life 
assurance, and also those levied on attorneys and solicitors, 
also came in for reduction. As for the taxes on know- 
ledge, which then were levied threefold — paper duty, 
advertisement duty, and the compulsory newspaper 
stamp — ^he proposed to reduce the duty on advertisements 
a hundred per cent., and to fix the duty on each news- 
paper at a penny a copy, without regard to its size, and 
without imposing an additional duty on supplements. 



78 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

To fill up the fiscal vacuum thus created, Mr. Glad- 
stone proposed to raise two millions a year, by extending 
the legacy duty to all successions, and by abolishing the 
unjust exemption which real property had hitherto en- 
joyed. And he increased the duty on Scotch spirits by 
one shilling, and on Irish by eightpence a gallon. 

Mr. Gladstone thus concluded his masterly speech, 

the salient points of which we have reproduced in the 

following words : — 

" I am almost afraid to look at the clock — shamefully reminding 
me, as it must, how long I have trespassed on the House. All I can 
say in apology is, that I have endeavoured to keep closely to the 
topics which I have had before me — 

' — immensum spatiis confecimus sequor, 
Et jam tempus sequum fumantia solvere colla.* 
These are the proposals of the Government. They may be approved 
or they may be condemned ; but I have this full confidence, that it 
Avill be admitted that we have not sought to evade the difficulties of 
the position ; that we have not concealed those difficulties either 
from ourselves or from others ; that we have not attempted to coun- 
teract them by narrow or flimsy expedients ; that we have prepared 
plans which, if you will adopt them, will go some way to close up 
many vexed financial questions, which, if not now settled, may be 
attended with public inconvenience, and even with public danger in 
future years, and under less favourable circumstances ; that we have 
endeavoured, in the plans we have now submitted to you, to make the 
path of our successors in future years not more arduous but more 
easy; and I may be permitted to add, that while we have sought to 
do justice, by the changes we propose in taxation, to intelligence and 
skill as compared with property — while we have sought to do justice 
to the great labour community of England by furthering their relief 
from indirect taxation, we have not been guided by any desire to put 
one class against another ; we have felt we should best maintain onv 
own honour, that we should best meet the views of Parliament, and 
best promote the interests of the country, by declining to draw any 
invidious distinction between class and class— by adopting it to our- 
selves as a sacred aim to diffuse and distribute the burdens as we 



THE ADMINISTRATION OF LORD ABERDEEN. 79 

must, and the beuefits if we can, with equal and impartial hand ; and 
•we have the consolation of believing, that by proposals such as these 
we contribute so far as ia us lies, not only to develop the material 
( *' resources of the country, but to knit the various parts of this great 
nation yet more closely than ever to that throne and to those institu- 
tions under which it is our happiness to live." 

By the Tories the resolutions based upon the Financial 
Statement were encountered with the hottest opposition, 
^ Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton commenced the onslaught 
by an amendment condemning the propositions about 
the Income Tax as " alike impolitic and unjust." He said 
he hoped that Mr. Gladstone would, as others had done 
before him (the allusion obviously being to the last Whig 
Chancellor, Sir Charles Wood), "retain his position and 
correct his measure." Mr. Newdegate attacked the 
whole Budget, and excited great laughter by describing 
the abolition of the soap duty as " another boon to Man- 
, Chester." He fiercely demanded when these boons to 
Manchester were to end. Mr. Cobden considered the 
scheme " a bold and honest proposal,** and expressed, at 
the conclusion of a long speech, his sincere hope that the 
Budget, which he believed had been generally accepted 
^ by the country, would, in its main provisions, pass the 
House. Mr. Cardwell called upon the House to "give its 
cordial assent to a measure replete with comfort and 
happiness to the people." Mr. Lowe held that " what- 
ever errors might be charged against the Budget, it was 
a financial scheme conceived in no servile spirit." Mr. 
Disraeli denounced " this obsequious deference to special 
interests," and concluded a most sarcastic speech by 
taunting Lord John Russell with having thrown away 
the Whig party, and " accepted a subordinate office under 
subordinate officers of Sir Robert Peel," and concluded by 



80 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

warning the representatives of large towns against split- 
ting up the national character of the country into sepa- 
rate sections, lest they should turn a first-rate kingdom, 
into a second-rate republic. Lord John Kussell ended a 
reply of much dignity by speaking of Mr. Gladstone's 
name as one " to be envied among the financial ministers 
of this country. If, in order to do this, it has been his 
fortune to live before his age, I trust he will find his 
reward in the approbation and support of this House, 
and in the gratitude of an admiring people." 

Amid much cheering, the amendment of Sir Edward 
Lytton was negatived by 323 to 252. After many 
other minor contests, in which much larger majo- 
rities recorded their votes with Ministers, the scheme 
finally passed the ordeal of the House of Commons at 
Midsummer, and within a few days it was ratified by 
the Peers. 

This great measure, the first of a series of great fiscal 
reforms introduced by Mr. Gladstone, was thoroughly 
approved by the majority of the nation, and elevated its 
author to a popularity which he had not as yet enjoyed. 
People of calm habit of mind remarked upon the amount 
of relief which it gave without injuring the national 
credit. There was hardly a class that was not greatly 
interested in the success of his propositions. As it was 
well put at the time : — " With the reduction on soap, 
tea, foreign butter, cheese, eggs, fruit, and more than 250 
other articles, carriages, horses, and stamps, we have no 
hesitation in saying that the man with ^120 a year will 
be at once better ofi" with the proposed changes, even on a 
bare computation of losses and gains, without taking 
into account the stimulus that such remissions must give 



r 



THE ADMINISTRATION OF LORD ABERDEEN. 81 

to trade. The case of tlie artisan we will leave to him- 
self, or rather to his wife, for if he will only tell her 
fairly the contents of the Budget, she can tell him that 
he will save several pounds a year by it." 

" On the whole," said the Times^ " we cannot but con- 
gratulate the British people on the gi*eat enterprise, the 
rare opportunities, and the high favour of Heaven, to which 
they owe the possibility of these great, we had almost said 
unexpected, reductions from their now hereditary burdens. 
We are at last happily doing what it is the first law of 
nature to do — we are transmitting to our children a 
richer, a nobler, and a less encumbered inheritance. While 
we sustain the glory of our forefathers, we are wiping 
away, by our own toils, the records of their folly and 
extravagances ; and have at last some hope that the day 
may actually come when England will be as free from 
the creditor at home as from the conqueror abroad." 

Hopeful, stimulating, and encouraging words these ! 
But, under Providence, circumstances, against which not 
the combined sagacity of all the finance Ministers who 
ever lived could foresee, caused, ere the end of the year, 
very different prospects for the land. There was a sadly 
deficient harvest in 1853, not only in Great Britain, but 
in every corn-producing country. But that which, at the 
close of 1853, riveted all men's attention, was the pro- 
bability of its being the last year of the great peace which 
followed the wars of the Frtach Revolution. The Czar 
Nicholas was making his final preparations for his spring 
at the throat of the Ottoman " Sick Man." Mr. Glad- 
stone went to Manchester in October, to inaugurate a 
statue of Sir Robei-t Peel. In the course of one of the 
speeches which he delivered there, he used these words : — 

F 



82 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

" The absorption of power "by one of the great potentates of Europe 
threatening to override all the rest, would be dangerous to the peace 
of the world ; the overthrow of the Ottoman Empire would precipitate 
that dangerous condition of affairs ; and against that result it is the 
duty of England to set herself, at any cost. Not that the Government 
or the people of this country can desire war — a calamity which stains 
the face of nature with hunaan gore, gives loose rein to crime, and takes 
bread from the people. No doubt negotiation is repugnant to the 
national impatience at the sight of injustice and oppression ; it is beset 
with delay, intrigue, and chicane. But these are not so horrible as 
war, if negotiation can be made to result in saving this country from a 
calamity which deprives the nation of subsistence, and arrests the 
operations of industry. To attain that result, if possible — still to 
attain it, if still possible — which is even yet their hope — her Majesty's 
Ministers have persevered in exercising that self-command and that 
self-restraint, which impatience may mistake for iiidifference, feeble- 
ness, or cowardice, but which are truly the crowning greatness of a 
great people, an.I which do not evince the want of readiness to vin- 
dicate, when the time conies, the honour of this country." 

These were ominous and foreboding words — the words 
of one hoping against hope. And they were all the more 
sad that they were uttered by a man who was known 
personally to be a lover as much of peace as of wise na- 
tional parsimony; and by that Minister who was the 
official guardian of the purse-strings of the nation. 

In January, 1854, the hopes of peace had almost en- 
tirely disappeared. The massacre of Sinope produced 
universal indignation, and destroyed all confidence in the 
assurances of the Czar Nicholas. And the entrance of 
the allied fleets into the Black Sea, itself almost an act 
of hostility, greatly diminished the chances of his returning 
a favourable answer to the representations of the Western 
Powers. On the 28th of March, Her Majesty declared 
war against Hussia. 

jMr. Gladstone took no part in the early and acri- 



THE ADMINISTRATION OF LOUD ABERDEEN. 83 

moiiious stages of discussion, in 1854, as to the way in 
which the Cabinet of which he was a member had "drifted 
into " the war. In the intervals of these hot and oft-rej^eated 
contests — premonitions of the impending resignation ol 
the Premiership by Lord Aberdeen — various domestic 
bills were introduced — introduced, for the most part, only 
to be withdrawn. One of these was a measure brought in 
by Lord John Kussell, to make certain alterations in the 
oaths taken by members of Parliament. Mr. Gladstone 
supported it in a speech which is worthy of passing notice, 
as it contained his first Parliamentary avowal of a change 
of opinion on a subject on which we have already seen 
that he more than once expressed, by speech and vote, 
opinions hostile to those entertained by the Liberal party. 
He plainly stated his belief that the strength of the 
country and the rights of the Crown consisted not in 
oaths and declarations, but in the attachment and fidelity 
of the people. The more we blotted out all those matters 
of strife, the sooner would be consolidated a firm and sure 
basis for the interests of the country. To prove that 
oaths could not bind men who thou^xht the oblisration in- 
consistent with their duty, he showed how Protestants 
themselves, who ought to be precluded from giving votes 
that afiect the property of the Church, had a few days 
previously proposed to deal with it by extinction. He 
concluded by expressing a decided opinion that Lord 
John Pussell had rendered a valuable service in handincr 
over to the axe of the executioner a bundle of useless 
oaths, which served as pitfalls to tender consciences, while 
they caused bold men to disregard conscience altogether. 

The Budget of 18-54 was neccsaarily one of a very 
difierent character from that of the year preceding. 

F 2 



84 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

That of 1853 was pre-eminently a Peace Budget. Its 
successor was more warlike than any the existing gene- 
ration had known. In some respects even the Financial 
Statement of 1854 presented favourable features. Thus 
the receipts of the current year had exceeded the esti- 
mates by more than a million ; but no longer was there 
any possibility of a heap of reductions, great and small, 
extending with marvellous fairness and breadth over the 
whole region of finance, elaborately calculated, artistically 
arranged, and expounded in a speech which far outdid the 
copious rhetoric of Peel. All the savings, present and 
prospective, had vanished at the first sound of war j and 
the estimated expenditure for the year forthcoming was 
three millions in excess of that of the financial year about 
to expire. In a word, three millions had to be found 
from sources other than those supplied through the 
existing channels of revenue. 

Mr. Gladstone saw that there was only one feasible 
course to adopt, and he faced it with a boldness worthy 
of the occasion. He proposed to double the income tax 
for half a year. And he intimated that if the war con- 
tinued up till July or August, the doubling process must 
be repeated for the second half of the year. For instant 
and pressing needs, he craved powers to issue Exchequer 
Bills to the amount of a million and three quarters, to be 
used as the successive claims arose. Should the peace of 
Europe be restored in the course of the summer, they 
would be withdrawn. Brief as this summary is, it really 
leaves out nothing of importance which is necessary to grasp 
the purport of the Budget of 1854. Two months later, 
however, it became necessary to make larger monetary pro- 
visions for the conduct of the war. This was effected by 



THE ADMINISTRATION OP LORD ABERDEEN. 85 

the augmentation of the imposts on Irish and Scotch 
spirits, malt, and sugar ; and the duration of the in- 
creased income tax and the malt duty was to be " for the 
term of the war," while the spirit duties were claimed and 
voted "without limitation." He set himself firmly 
against the principle of loans, and maintained, so long as 
the capacity existed, and the patriotic willingness for 
self-denial and sacrifice could be appealed to, the expenses 
of the war should be defrayed as they occuiTed. In this 
he showed great nobility of character. There was an 
infinitude of truth in these sentences : — 

*'I beg the committee will recollect, that if there is any one man 
in this country who, beyond every other, except perhaps a capitalist, 
has an interest in recommending recourse to a loan, it is the individual 
who has the henour of filling the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer. 
That office is an office which any man may be thankful to hold at a 
time when his occupation is to deal with those timely resources which 
wise legislation has given to him, and to distribute what may well be 
called the bounty of the legislature, because it results from the wisdom 
of Parliament, among the various classes of the community in the 
remission ©f charges ; bnt that happy course is wofully changed when 
there comes on a period of war. It is not onlj'^ a losing office, but a 
miserable and wretched office, to be constantly engaged in inventing 
the means of carrying on war, and of drawing fresh taxes from the 
pockets of the people. Every good motive and every bad motive, 
combated only by the desire of the approval of honourable men and 
by conscientious rectitude ; every motive of ease, of comfort, and of 
certainty, spring forward in his mind to induce a Chancellor of the 
Exchequer to become the first man to recommend a loan." 

Against very animated opposition, led by Mr. Disraeli 
and Mr. Thomas Baring, the House affirmed the principle 
of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, by a majority of 
more than a hundred. 

Mr. Gladstone introduced, in this the second year of 
his first Chancellorship, a measure of very considerable 



86 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

constitutional importance — the Public Kevenue and Con- 
solidated Funds Charges Bill. Its object was to alter the 
machinery of the public accounts by bringing the gross 
income directly into the Exchequer, including certain 
deductions which had previously been made in transit, 
but which, it was provided, should in future be voted in 
Supply. By bringing these charges under the control 
of Parliament, an additional security has since been 
afforded by the Executive for the discharge of its duty. 

The Cabinet of Lord Aberdeen had been growing 
throughout 1854 more unpopular everyday. The sole 
cause of this loss of favour was the manner in which the 
war was conducted. The financial arrangements of the 
Ministry were not found fault with, and Mr. Gladstone, 
therefore, shared the unpopularity only so far as he shared 
the general responsibility of the administration of depart- 
ments other than his own. Upon the meeting of Par- 
liament in 1855, hostile notices of motions criticising the 
management of the war were put upon the table by 
Lord Ellenborough in one House, and by Mr. Boebuck 
in the other. Ere the discussion of Mr. Boebuck's motion, 
which was fixed for the 25th of January, came on, the 
public were astonished by the formal announcement of 
the resignation of Lord John Bussell. He evidently 
feared the results of the impending inquisition, and 
sought personal safety by leaving a tottering house ere 
its fall. In stating publicly the reasons for his resigna- 
tion, he said he should look back with pride to his asso- 
ciation with many measures of the Administration, and 
particularly with Mr. Gladstone's scheme of 1853. 

In the great and important debate on Mr. Koebuck's 
motion, Mr, Gladstone, while thanking his late colleague 



THE ADMINISTRATION OP LORD ABERDEEN. 87 

for the eulogium passed upon himself, gently chid him for 
having resigned without giving his colleagues a chance of 
acceding to his demands. He went on to say that it 
might be thought that, deprived of the support of the 
noble lord, Ministers ought not to have met the House 
without at least some reorganisation. But he felt tha4i 
they had no right to attempt to make terms with the 
House in that way, or to shrink from facing its judgment 
on their past conduct. If they had no spirit, what kind 
of epitaph would be placed over their remains? He 
would himself have thus Avritten it : — " Here lie the dis- 
honoured ashes of a Ministry which found England at 
peace and left it at war ; which was content to enjoy the 
emoluments of oflG.ce and to wield the sceptre of power so 
long as no man had the courage to question their exist- 
ence. They saw the storm gathering over the country ; 
they heard the agonising accounts which were almost 
daily received of the sick and wounded in the East ; but 
had these things moved them ? As soon, however, as the 
member for SheflSeld raised his hand to point the thunder- 
bolt, they shrank away conscience-stricken ; the sense of 
grief overwhelmed them; and, to escape from punishment, 
they ran away from duty." He went on to give his 
reasons for the belief that Mr. Roebuck's motion would 
aggravate rather than alleviate the evils which all 
acknowledged. He indignantly protested against it, as 
useless to the army, unconstitutional in its nature, and 
dangerous to the honour and interests of the Commons of 
England. 

The motion was carried by the enormous majority of 
157. Two days after, on the 1st of February, Lord 
Aberdeen and Lord Palmerston announced that Minis- 



88 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

ters had placed their resignations in the hands of Her 
Majesty; and that she had been graciously pleased to 
accept them. 

Thus fell the Coalition Cabinet, which in innate 
power and Parliamentary influence was apparently one 
of the strongest Governments ever seen in England. 
But in reality it was weak from the first — " a Ministiy 
of suspended opinions and smothered antipathies." "With 
the single exception of Lord Palmerston, Mr. Gladstone 
fell from office with less detriment to his reputation 
than any of his colleagues. 

The following pen-and-ink portrait of Mr. Gladstone 
during his first Chancellorship of the Exchequer, will 
have all the more weight attached to its laudatory ex- 
pressions, that it is taken from a quarter which, to say 
the least, was not likely to err on the side of partiality. 
The passage is extracted from an able article on the 
" House of Commons," which appeared in the Quarterly 
Review for June, 1854: — "Mr. Gladstone is the most 
polished speaker in the House of Commons. His verbal 
resources are as remarkable as his management of them ; 
and his manner is invariably that of a gentleman. He 
is charged with * subtlety' by coarser minds, but we 
fancy that the English intellect, which is not distin- 
guished for its analytical power, treats the subject in a 
somewhat jumbling fashion. Mr. Gladstone inclines to 
the Tractarian party — Tractarians are no better than 
Jesuits — Jesuits are particularly subtle, and therefore, 
when Mr. Gladstone is defining, very elaborately, the 
difference between long annuities and deferred annui- 
ties, he is talking Jesuitically. We believe Mr. Glad- 
stone would be a more popular orator if he would be 



THE ADMINISTRATION OF LORD ABERDEEN. 89 

less explicit ; but while he exhausts the subject, he some- 
times exhausts the listener. His refined and scholarly 
periods, the creation of the moment, but as elegantly 
balanced and as keenly pointed as if they had been written 
and studied, are always marvels of fluency, and often 
specimens of eloquence." 



CHAPTEE VII. 

THE PERIOD OP THE CRIMEAN WAR. 

Before many days had passed Mr. Gladstone was re- 
establislied in the position of Chancellor of the Ex- 
chequer. After in succession Lord John Russell and 
Lord Derby had failed to form Administrations, the 
Queen sent for Lord Palmerston, whom already the 
voice of the nation had almost unanimously called for 
as the one fit man to be Premier in time of war. His 
Cabinet was in reality the old one reconstructed, with 
some partial changes and redistribution of ofiices, but Mr. 
Gladstone's position remained unaffected. However, not 
many days had elapsed from the date of the reconstruc- 
tion of the Cabinet ere Mr. Gladstone, along with his 
friends Sir James Graham and Mr. Sidney Herbert, re- 
signed office on learning that Mr. Koebuck intended to 
persevere with his resolution for the appointment of a 
committee of inquiry into the condition of the army in 
the Crimea. In a lengthy speech, in which he explained 
the grounds of his resignation, he stated his belief that 
the Cabinet had adopted a "fatal choice" when they 
agreed to the inquiry. He showed that the proposed 
committee would not be a committee of punishment, nor 
a committee of remedy, but a committee of government, 
taking from the executive the most important and deli- 



THE PERIOD OP THE CRIMEAN WAR. 91 

cate of its functions. He proceeded, after paying a warm 
tribute to Lord Aberdeen, who, lie said, had been dis- 
missed by a blow darkly dealt from an official hand : — 

" I may be told that I ought to have thought of this three weeks 
ago, and ought to have known that the House of Commons would not 
reverse its judgment. It is a much smaller matter that my rig lit 
honourable friends and myself should be convicted of levity and in. 
considerateness three weeks ago, than now of a great public delinquency. 
Let it be granted that we have made a great omission, that would 
not justify us now in concurring in a policy which we say is false and 
erroneous. But I do not plead guilty to the charge of incousiderate- 
ness. I never doubted that my noble friend at the head of the 
Government would and must entertain the same opiaions Avitli respect 
to the committee which he did when he first besought the House 
in earnest language not to grant it ; and my noble friend is aware 
that, before my acceptance of office imder his government was an- 
nounced to the world, I had the satisfaction of conversing with him 
on the subject of this committee, in which conversation he acquainted 
me with his contiiiued opinion that the opposition of Government ought 
to be offered to its appointment. This can be no secret, because the 
right honourable gentlemen opposite, and indeed, I might say, tlie 
whole world, must have observed that this, and this only, was tlie 
meaning of a portion of the speech delivered by i^y noble friend when 
he addressed the House after the formation of the Government." 

From this date Mr. Gladstone held no public office 
for more than four yeai-s — during the first Administra- 
tion of Lord Palmerston and the second of Lord Derby. 
As long as the Crim.ean war lasted he continued to give 
a modified support to the Palmerston Ministry, now 
composed exclusively of Whigs, and without any infusion 
of the Peelite element, Lord Canning, the Postmaster- 
4 General, alone excepted. 

In the early spring of 1855, while Lord John Pussell 
was endeavouring to patch up a peace at Vienna,, and 
after his return from his somewh^-t ludicrous discharge of 



92 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

unwonted diplomatic duties, the warlike spirit was 
becoming more intense in the nation, and that spirit was 
adequately represented in the Parliament. Among other 
motions hostile to Government, and breathing bellicose 
fire, was one by Mr. Disraeli, introduced by him on the 
24th of May — " That this House cannot adjourn for the 
recess without expressing its dissatisfaction with the 
ambiguous language and uncertain conduct of Her 
Majesty's Government in reference to the great question 
of peace or war j and that, under these circumstances, 
the House feels it a duty to declare that it will continue 
to give every support to Her Majesty in the prosecution 
of the war, until Her Majesty shall, in conjunction with 
her allies, obtain for the country a safe and honourable 
peace." This was met by Sir William Heathcote, the 
successor of Sir Robert Harry Inglis as Mr. Gladstone's 
colleague in the representation of the University, by a con- 
ciliatory amendment, in which he proposed to introduce 
the terms, " still cherishing a desire that the communica- 
tions in progress, may arrive at a successful issue." Mr. 
Gladstone lent his powerful aid to the proposition of his 
friend and colleague. His natural love of peace was 
strongly displayed in his speech. He started with the 
general position that a war just in its origin would be 
unjust if prosecuted after its object had been attained. 
This, in the main, he held, was the case with the war now 
being waged. Having read the demands of the Allied 
Powers, and the answer of the Emperor of Russia in the 
beginning of 1854, and contrasted them with the terms to i 
which Russia had since consented to at Vienna, he asked, 
could it be justly said that the objects of the war were 
yet unattained ? The " four points " proposed at Vienna 



TllE PERIOD OF THE CKIMEAN WAR. 93 

by Lord John Kussell had, in August, 1854, been abso- 
hitely rejected by Kussia, but in December the Czav 
promised his unreserved acceptance of terms which four 
months before he had contemptuously rejected. The only 
one of these articles not now settled was the third ; and 
the difference arose, not upon its principle, but upon the 
mode of its application, so that the quarrel was merely as 
to the mode of construing a moiety of the third point. 
The question of the Black Sea, he observed, was sur- 
rounded with difficulties, and the choice was to be made 
between several plans of limitation, all being open to 
objections and imperfect arrangements. The more he 
looked at the question of limitation, the more apparent 
was its enormous difficulty and the indignity it would 
offer to Russia. And no policy could be more dangerous 
than that of inflicting indignity upon her without re- 
ducing her power. He went on to discuss the proposi- 
tions of Russia, observing that her plenipotentiaries 
insisted, with some reason, that a plan of limitation would 
better accord with an aggressive policy on her part, than 
the discretional power she offered to Turkey. Russia 
had receded from her pretence ; she had gone far to put 
herself in the right, and in war, as well as in peace, the 
great object should be to be in the right. All the terms 
we had demanded had been substantially conceded ; and 
if it was not for terms we fought, but for military success, 
let the House look at this sentiment with the eye of 
reason, and it would appear immoral, inhuman, and un- 
christian. If the war was continued in order to obtain 
military glory, we should tempt the justice of Him in 
whose hands was the fate of armies, to launch ujDon us 
His wrath. 



94 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

Neither tlie Parliament nor the nation was in tlie 
liumour to listen to such language and such arguments 
as these. Parliament once more re-affirmed a thoroncih 
determination of belligerency, and the war went on with 
greatly intensified force. 

The mismanagement of the war gave rise to the well- 
known agitation for administrative reform, which resulted 
in the partial opening up of the appointments in some, 
and the comjDlete opening in others, of the public depart- 
ments. Mr. Layard was the first to raise this important 
matter. Mr. Gladstone " heartily wished him God speed," 
and said that he saw with unfeigned satisfaction that the 
state of public feeling was likely to take the direction 
given to it by Mr. Layard. He believed, in contra- 
distinction to the popular opinion, that the system of 
patronage was the weakness, not the strength of the 
Executive. "What he wanted was a change in the basis 
of the whole system of the Civil Service ; perfectly free 
competition for admissions by the test of examination, 
and subsequent promotion by merit and efficiency alone. 
The public, he held, had a right to be served by the best 
men it could get for the price it ofi'ered. And he con- 
tended, not only that the existing system did not give 
the best men, but that it created a vast mass of collateral 
evils connected with the dispensation of patronage, which 
kept a large class of men in a state of expectancy, wasting 
their lives in solicitation. 

Towards the close of the session, Mr. Gladstone 
embraced a pertinent opportunity to deliver another 
remarkable and emphatic speech against the farther 
prolongation of the war. He pointedly , repeated his 
belief that the reai')onsibility for the rejection of the 



THE PERIOD OP THE CRIMEAN WAR. 95 

amicable and intercessory propositions of Austria lay 
Avitli the British Government. They could never get 
over the fact that all the pleni])otentiaries at Vienna 
adopted the principle of counterpoise; and that the 
Government, rejecting the golden opportunity of making 
peace, continued to make war on account of paltry 
diiferences. The best peace was not that which looked 
best on paper, but that which secured the united support 
of Europe. Defying the Western Powers to control the 
liiture destinies of Russia, except for a moment, he pro- 
ceeded to paint in unfavourable colours the position of 
the allies : — Austria gradually separating from us ; Turkey 
an ally, but such an ally as -<^neas found Anchises in his 
flight from Troy; Sardinia, heavily burdened, dragged 
through the conflict as a mere dependent of England ; 
and France — was it likely that the French people would 
add £100,000,000 to their public debt for the sake of the 
' difierence between limitation and counterpoise, and not 
for military glory 1 

And whom were we fighting 1 The Russian soldier, 
fired with patriotism and religious zeal, was fighting 
against the hereditary enemies of his religion, and the 
invaders of his soil. " I am thankful," he concluded, 
" for the indulgence and freedom of speech which have 
^been accorded me ; I remain content in the belief that in 
endeavouring to recall the Government from that course 
of policy which they are now pursuing, I am discharging 
my duty as a patriot and a loyal subject of my Queen." 

When the discussion of the Budget of Sir George 

•Cornewall Lewis came on, Mr. Gladstone took the same 

anti-warlike tone. He admitted the necessity of the 

]»roppscd loan, though he had still the same objections 



96 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

to loans as when in office. He had borrowed money, 
but only in anticipation of taxes. He would, he said, 
have been better satisfied if the financial statement could 
have been deferred until the conclusion of the negotia- 
tions for peace, since the result might afiect the amount 
of expenditure required. 

When peace had returned at the commencement of 
1856, Mr. Gladstone said he regarded the peace as an 
honourable one, because the objects of the war had been 
attained. But if he thought that the treaty bound this 
country to maintain the existing institutions of Turkey, 
he should not be able to express his satisfaction. The 
guarantee of the independence and integrity of Turkey 
was not to be regarded as a permanent settlement of the 
internal state of that country ; its sole object was to 
secure her against foreign aggression. The general object 
achieved for Europe by the war was far more extended 
than any stipulation which could be put on paper. The 
war had been a moral demonstration to almost the whole 
of Europe, and had impressed upon Kussia the great 
lesson that her attempts at aggression were a matter for 
the consideration of the whole of Europe, and such as to 
make it the duty of Europe to unite all its energies for 
their suppression. 

He made a somewhat important remark on the mattei** 
of arbitration, to which an unprecedented prominence 
had been given in the terms of the Peace of Paris. 
While he looked upon its recognition as a great triumph, 
he at the same time pointed out a danger. If encourage- 
ment, said he, should be given to trumped-up and un- 
tenable claims, more quarrels would be made than 
mended ; and he laid down the principle that no country 



THE PERIOD OF THE CRIMEAN WAR. 97 

ought to resort to arbitration until it had reduced its 
claims to a minimum which it was ready to support 
by force. Lay down that rule, and a resort to arbitration 
would be a powerful engine on behalf of civilisation and 
humanity, which he hoped would lead to a diminution 
of that scourge of Europe — the enormous cost of iU', 
military establishments. 

Long ere Mr. Gladstone had reached the period of 
his variously busy life at which we have now arrived, his 
name had become conspicuous outside the land as a friend 
and fellow-worker in many departments of the great 
movement so characteristic of his time, for the religious, 
moral, social, and educational elevation of the masses. It 
is impossible, consistently with according due space to 
the large political questions with which his name has 
been chiefly identified, and about which the curiosity of 
most readers is chiefly concerned, to follow his career in 
this unobtrusive but important domain. We content 
ourselves with presenting, as a representative specimen 
of very many like utterances, a few words from a speech 
which he delivered at the inauguration, in this year, of 
the admirable schools founded for the children of artisans 
by the Rev. William Rogers, in the district adjoining 
the Charterhouse : — 

" They had sung, during the ceremony of that day, a psalm, in which 
it was said that * Children and the fruit of the womb are an heritage 
and gift that couieth of the Lord.' They knew those words were 
founded deep in the truths of the Divine Word. But there was no 
man who walked through the streets of London, and especially the 
more wretched parts of it, who did not feel that those words were a 
trial of his faith. When they considered what human Bature was and 
at what cost it had been redeemed ; when they reflected what des- 
tinies were open to it ; how many and great were its vicissitudes, and 

* G 



98 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

Low severe were its temptations and its trials, it was terrible to think 
of the amount of labour that remained undischarged. And yet 
* Children and the fruit of the womb are an heritage and gift that 
cometh of the Lord ;' and difficult though it might be, yet it was not 
impossible to carry home to the hearts and minds of men, and into the 
houses of orery class of the community, the blessed and comforting 
consciousnesjj of that, truth, so that, instead of a trial of faith, it 
should, on the contrary, become the daily food and support of fathers 
and mothers, who, though it might be their lot to earn their bread— 
and perhaps scanty bread — by the labour of their hands and the 
sweat of their brows, might see their offcpring growing up in the faith, 
fear, and love of God." 



m- 



•■■y*. ■^ 



CHAPTEK YIII. 

FALL OP THE PALMERSTON MINISTRY. 

In criticising the financial policy of the Government in 
1857, Mr. Gladstone took a rigidly economical line. 
With reference, more especially, to the income tax, and 
an agitation which had arisen in the country against its 
continuance, he said that he earnestly desired to bring the 
minds of the people of the country to a consideration of 
that question which necessarily came first — what was the 
just and reasonable scale of expenditure. If the 9d. in- 
come tax were given up without an equivalent reduction 
of the estimates, there must either be new taxation or a 
loan. He would be no party to either ; he felt it to be 
his bounden duty first to lay hold of the expenditure, 
and to battle with the estimates. He continued : — 

** As far as my duty is concerned, it "will be my effort and labour to 
secure a fulfilment of the pledges given in 1853. I understand these 
pledges as the right honourable gentleman (Mr. Disraeli) understands 
them. I hare not forgotten them. I never can forget to the latest 
day of my life, and I shall always remember with gratitude, the con- 
duct of the House of Commons at the period when those measures 
were adopted, and the generosity of the sentiments which they evinced. 
I must endeavour to answer that conduct, at least so far as depends on 
me ; and I shall endeavour to answer that conduct by striving to bring 
the expenditure of the country and its fiscal arrangements into such 
a shape as Avill allow the extinction of the ijicome tax in 1860." 

Q 2 



100 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

The discussions on finance in this session, in which 
Mr. Gladstone proved himself at once the most fearless 
and the most formidable assailant of Ministers, were in- 
terrupted by the great contest in which all parties and 
sections of parties united to condemn Lord Palmer- 
ston and his colleagues for their alleged causeless instiga- 
tion of a war with China. Out of a dispute between 
Dr. Bowring, the Governor of Hong Kong, and the com- 
missioner of the Chinese Government at Canton, there 
arose a defeat of the Ministry in the House of Commons, 
an appeal from that decision to the ultimate tribunal of 
the nation, the election of a new Parliament, and the un- 
seating of several prominent Members of the former Par- 
liament who had joined in the condemnation of Ministers. 
"When the news of the collision between the Chinese and 
the British authorities in the Canton Biver arrived in 
England, Lord Derby and Mr. Cobden at once gave notices 
of motions adverse to the Government. In the House of 
Peers a majority of thirty-six was recorded against 
Ministers. 

In the other House the debate, commenced by Mr. 
Cobden, was continued for four nights. On the fourth 
and last night of the debate, Mr. Gladstone spoke, and 
expressed his entire concurrence with the views of Mr. 
Cobden. He denied the allegation that we had " fester- 
ino- wrongs" against the Chinese. He reminded the 
House that no answer had been given to the objection 
that if a wrong had been committed by the Chinese 
in the case of the " lorcha," the Arrow, the proper remedy 
was by reprisals. He denied the position which had 
been taken by the Attorney-General, that the term 
"British subject" in the treaty meant any Chinaman 



FALL OF THE PALMEKSTON MINISTRY. 101 

resident at Hmig Kong. When we talked of treaty 
obligations by the Chinese, what, he asked, were our 
treaty obligations towards them ? The purpose for which 
Hong Kong was given to us was, that it should be a port 
in which British ships might careen and refit. Was not 
our contraband trade in opium a breach of treaty obli- 
gations? Had our Government struggled to put it down, 
as bound by treaty? Had they not encouraged it by 
organising a fleet of lorchas under the British flag ? 
They who put the British flag to the uses to which 
it was put in China, stained that flag. Mr. Gladstone 
dwelt with much energy upon the calamities that had 
been inflicted upon the inhabitants of Canton. For what 
were we at war with the Chinese ? The Government 
had not stated what we were asking from them. Were 
we afraid of the moral effect upon the Chinese if the acts 
of the Government were disavowed? But consider, he 
concluded, the moral impression which must now be 
produced, and never could be avoided. If the House had 
the courage to assert its prerogative, and adopted this 
resolution, it would pursue a course consistent at once 
with sound policy and the principles of eternal justice. 

The result was a majority of sixteen against the Govern- 
ment — 263, as against 247, voting with Mr. Cobden. 
The division took place on the 3rd of March. Two days 
later, the Premier stated that Ministers had determined 
to advise Her Majesty to dissolve Parliament. Mr. 
Gladstone was unopposed at Oxford, and was again 
returned along with Sir William Heathcote. Lord Pal- 
merston met the new Parliament with a strong and an 
enthusiastic majority. His supporters formed an influen- 
tial and compact body; his more formidable opponents 



102 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

were driven from the field, or weakened by the conscious- 
ness that the public voice had declared against them. 

A year had not elapsed ere the triumphant majority 
which had endorsed Lord Palmerston's Chinese policy 
had dwindled into a minority. After the attempt of 
Felice Orsini on the life of the French Emperor, Lord 
Palmerston introduced his well-known Conspiracy to 
Murder Bill, by which he sought greater powers by which 
the Executive should restrain and punish conspiracies 
against the lives of foreign potentates, hatched upon 
British soil. Instantaneously, the country was up in 
arms against what was generally deemed an infraction 
of the ancient privilege of asylum. Meetings were instan- 
taneously convened, and the vast numbers of the audiences, 
and the hearty approbation which they accorded to the 
spokesmen, equally showed that the heart of the country 
was stirred. Mr. Milner Gibson was selected to reflect 
the popular voice within St. Stephen's Hall. He moved 
an amendment, the gist of which was a practical nega- 
tive to the proposal. Amongst others who supported him 
by speech and vote was Mr. Gladstone. The arguments of 
the opponents of the Ministers prevailed, and to the great 
delight of the nation. Ministers were defeated by 234 to 
215. This was on Friday. On the following Monday 
(the 22nd of February), Lord Palmerston announced the 
resignation of himself and his colleagues, and in a few 
days Lord Derby became for the second time Prime 
Minister of England. 



) 



CHAPTER IX. 

LORD derby's second ADMINISTRATION. 

The first important measure introduced by the Adminis- 
tration of Lord Derby subsequent to the downfall of the 
Palmerston Ministry, was their bill for the abolition of 
the governing powers of the East India Company, their 
transference to the Crown and the home Government, 
and for the better government of India generally. The 
proposal in its first shape was looked upon with very 
great disfavour by the country at large, and especially 
by the magnates of the commercial community whom it 
had been the special object of Ministers to conciliate by 
certain provisions of the bill. Mr. Gladstone strongly 
expressed his coincidence of opinion with the objections 
urged against it. Indeed, he found fault with the veiy 
basis of the proposal, as well as with its details. He 
said that he could not see either in the first or the 
amended edition of the scheme any elements of good, 
and there was great difficulty in attempting to govern 
a people separated not only by distance, but by blood, 
and by institutions. The Court of Directors had been 
practically a protecting body to the people of India, 
and there ought to be supplied a no less efficient pro- 
vision for that object. For this — a protection afforded 
to the people of India against the ignorance, error, or 



104 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

indiscretion of tlie people of England — he looked in vain. 
He added, that there had grown up a system fraught 
with danger to the Parliament and to the liberties of the 
people of England, as well as of India, by undue and 
unconstitutional exercise of power by the Executive here, 
through the treasury and army of India, by which wars 
were commenced without the knowledge or consent of 
Parliament, and an accumulation of debt was cast upon 
India. 

When the great debates upon the " clemency " pro- 
clamation of Governor-General Lord Canning, and the 
hasty resignation of Lord Ellenborough, came a little 
later in the year, Mr. Gladstone afforded his valuable 
aid to Ministers, and counselled his friend, Mr. Cardwell, 
to withdraw the motion hostile to Ministers, which he 
had laid on the table. Mr. Gladstone's defection from 
his accustomed allies had much to do with saving the 
Ministry, and with the production of an unexpected and 
lame conclusion of a great Parliamentary conflict, that 
had for several days held the fate of the Government in 
suspense, and kept the country on the tenter-hooks of 
expectation. On more than one occasion, Mr. Gladstone 
did similar service to Ministers, and more than once 
there occurred more or less angry recriminations between 
liim and the former colleagues whom he had helped to 
oust early in the year. At this period the state of 
political parties was extremely disjointed. In many 
men's mouths were to be found the alternatives of a 
change of Ministry, a reconstruction of parties, or a 
dissolution. It was well known, that ere the offer was 
made to Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, the post of Secretary 
for the Colonies was offered to and declined by Mr. 



LOBD derby's second ADMINISTRATION. 105 

Gladstone. Tlie debates were at once perplexing and 
exciting. The principal performers were changing their 
parts every night. Members and strangers entered the 
House with an utter uncertainty what Lord Palmerston, 
Lord John Eussell, Mr. Disraeli, or Mr. Gladstone 
would do or say. But each of them was almost expected 
to appear in exactly opposite positions to that which 
they had occupied on the previous evening. One night, 
Lord John and Mr. Gladstone were bolstering up the 
Government against the attacks of Lord Palmerston, 
»Sir George Cornewall Lewis, and Sir Richard Bethell ; 
and the next, Lord Palmerston was hotly and angrily 
declaring that Lord John Pussell and Mr. Gladstone 
were the most ignorant and mischievous meddlers in 
foreign politics, Messrs. Roebuck and Bright hardly 
excepted. Mr. Gladstone and others — he being the 
chief — were eminently worthy of ministerial gi'atitude; 
for, when the Whitsuntide holidays came round, the 
opinion was generally expressed — an opinion directly 
the reverse of that generally uttered a very short time 

' previously — that notwithstanding the paucity of their 
supporters in the House of Commons, the Administra- 
tion would retain their seats for the remainder of the 
session. 

^ After the recess, Mr. Gladstone continued his support 
to Mr. Disraeli on the important question of the Budget. 
The Budget of this year, owing to the commercial em- 
barrassments of the preceding autumn, large reductions 

^ in the rates of the income tax in the previous year, and 
the necessity of increased expenditure in the navy, was 
a very severe ordeal for the financial abilities of Mr. 
Disraeli. When he rose he displayed a most unusual 



106 WILLIAM EWAKT GLADSTONE. 

amount of nervousness, wliicli gradually wore away as 
he proceeded. He indulged in a deprecatory style of 
conciliation, and the most ornate compliments to the wis- 
dom of Mr. Gladstone, and declared his determination to 
adhere to the pledge about the gradual reduction of the 
income tax given by the latter in 1853. Although 
Mr. Gladstone remained in his favourite attitude while 
Budget speeches are being delivered — ^namely, with arms 
folded, legs stretched out, and hat pulled over the eyes, 
and a general air of contemptuous inattention varied 
by an occasional yawn — yet it was clear that the 
Chancellor had got quit of his most dangerous critic, 
a.nd that as a whole his scheme was safe. 

While giving, however, a general support to the 
Financial Scheme, he did not omit to renew his now 
annual protest against Parliamentary thriftlessness. He 
stated his strong objections to the permanency of the 
income tax. He believed that its essential nature was 
to corrupt and demoralise ; and that as long as Parlia- 
ment consented, without a special purpose, to vote the 
income tax as part of our ordinary expenditure, so long 
would it be utterly in vain to talk of economy. 

The principal subjects which occupied public atten- 
tion in England at the commencement of 1859 were 
the Reform of Parliament, on which Ministers were' 
pledged to introduce a measure, and the state of foreign 
politics, particularly with reference to France, Austria, 
and Italy. When Lord John Russell tabled his resolu- 
tion of hostility to the Reform Bill of 1859, which was< 
born of the "Willis's " Rooms compact, and which proved 
victorious, Mr. Gladstone, still acting at variance with 
all his recent political associates, gave a general, though a 



LORD derby's second ADMINISTRATION. 107 

guarded support to Ministers. If we could have a strong 
Government, he urged, formed bv the Opposition, he 
should vote with Lord John Russell. But he saw that 
after carrying the resolution, the Opposition would follow 
separate courses. Greatly to the amusement of the 
House, he thus depicted the failures of previous Govern- 
ments:— -"In 1851, my noble friend, then the First 
Minister of the Crown, approached the question of 
Reform, and commenced with a promise of what was 
to be done twelve months afterwards. In 1852, he 
brought in a bill, and it disappeared, together with the 
Mini'stry. In 1853 we had the Ministry of Lord 
Aberdeen, which commenced with a promise of Reform 
in twelve months' time. Well, 1854 arrived; with it 
arrived the bill ; but with it also arrived the war, and 
in the war was a reason, and I believe a good reason, for 
abandoning the bill. Then came the Government of 
Lord Palmerston, which was not less unfortunate in the 
circumstances which prevented the redemption of those 
pledges that had been given to the people from the 
mouth of the Sovereign on the throne. In 1855, my 
noble friend escaped all responsibility of a Reform Bill 
on account of the war; in 1856, he escaped all responsi- 
bility for Reform on account of the peace. In 1857, he 
escaped that inconvenient responsibility by the dissolution 
of Parliament; and in 1858, he escaped again by the 
dissolution of his Government. This series of events 
strengthens the misgivings of the people that the House 
' is reluctant to deal with the question, makes it more 
hazardous to interpose obstacles, and requires the pro- 
gress of this bill to completion." And, as the Government 
had said they would abandon the bill, if the resolution 



108 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

were pressed and carried, he urged that it should be 
withdrawn and allowed to pass into committee. 

One of the most noteworthy points of this address was 
that portion of it in which he spoke most strongly in 
behalf of small nomination boroughs. He said he re- 
garded them as supplying the race of men who were 
trained to carry on the government of the country, the 
masters of civil wisdom, like Mr. Burke, Sir James 
Macintosh, Mr. Pelham, Lord Chatham, Mr. Fox, Mr. 
Pitt, Mr. Canning, Sir Robert Peel, all of whom sat first 
for small boroughs. If there was to be no ingress to the 
House but one, and that one the suffrages of a large mass 
of voters, there would be a dead level of mediocrity. The 
extension, the durability of our liberty, were to be attri- 
buted, under Providence, to distinguished statesmen 
introduced into the House at an early age. But large 
constituencies would not return boys, and therefore he 
hoped the small boroughs would be retained. 

Ministers were defeated by a majority of thirty-nine 
on the night of the delivery of Mr. Gladstone's speech, 
and they forthwith availed themselves of their privilege 
of an appeal to the country. The new Parliament re- 
assembled on the last day of May, and a trial of strength 
was at once challenged, in the form of a vote of want of 
confidence moved by the Marquis of Hartington. The 
motion was aimed fully as much against the foreign — and 
especially the Italian — as the domestic policy of Ministers. 
They were defeated by thirteen, and at once resigned. Lord 
Palmerston was sent for, and, in the Administration which 
he formed, Mr. Gladstone returned to his former position 
at the Exchequer. 



CHAPTER X. 

THE COMMERCIAL TREATY WITH FRANCE. 

Shortly after Lis resumption of office in 1859, a measure 
Ava^ introduced, which Mr. Gladstone and other members 
of the Cabinet supported, by which it was proposed to 
open up the office of Lord Chancellor of Ireland to 
Roman Catholics. There was a general impression among 
the more decided Protestants, that such a measure, intro- 
duced at such a moment, meant more than met the eye ; 
both the Irish law officers of the Crown being Roman 
Catholics. The Government evinced a "suspicious readi- 
ness " to take up the scheme. Mr. Newdegate groaned 
loudly, and a hostile motion of Mr. Whiteside was 
peculiarly deep in its Orange dye. What was most sur- 
prising was the tone and manner of Mr. Gladstone. 
While Mr. Card well was balancing the two parties in 
Ireland in his elaborate sentences, as an Irish Secretary 
is always obliged to do, Mr. Gladstone stood at the bar 
in an attitude which seemed to indicate something near 
akin to contempt for the business which his fellow-official 
was mincingly manipulating. But after Mr. Whiteside 
vhad spoken a few sentences, in which he referred in a 
sneering tone to Mr. Gladstone, reproaching him for 
inconsistency and tergiversation, he glided quietly into 
his seat ; and when Mr. WhiteKside sat down he started 



110 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

up, with his face full of fire and his manner flushed with 
vigour, and in a masterly, keen, and crushing speech of 
only ten minutes — a speech at once dignified, humorous, 
argumentative, and piled up with epigram — concen- 
ti-ated every faculty of an orator, and all the scorn of an 
offended man of spirit. It was a burst of earnest speech- 
making rarely to be found in the House of Commons, 
and well worth waiting through a long hot summer 
night to listen to. 

A not unfriendly contemporary critic thus described 
Mr. Gladstone on the night of the introduction of Jiis 
1859 Budget: — "As he walked up the House, we could 
not help remarking how slight, and thin, and weakly his 
person looks ; and yet, since he has resumed the labours of 
an office which to no man can be light, but to him, whose 
earnestness is almost a disease, must be an ever-burning if 
not a consuming fire, he appears to have gathered fresh- 
ness, alacrity, and cheeriness ; to have dropped the fretful 
nervousness which characterises him out of office ; and, in 
short, to justify the theory that great work is great happi- 
ness. . . . Speculation was rife whether there was to be 
a five or six hours' dissertation on finance ; and when the 
Chancellor of the Exchequer came, in a cool white waist- 
coat and trousers, looking like a cricketer who was 
prepared for a heavy innings, bets ran in favour of the > 
longer period. The moment, however, that he commenced, 
the hints that had been going about all day about a pro- 
visional Budget appeared likely to be realised. He plunged 
at once, without a single prefatory flourish, into facts and 
figures, and so continued all through the very brief space 
— for a financial statement — of an hour and a half, to dis- 
course in the most practical, plain, straightforward style 



THE COMMERCIAL TREATY WITH FRANCE. Ill 

that could have been predicted of any one. One single, 
nervous, brilliant burst — but even that compressed into a 
sentence — comprised the peroration of the clearest, most 
masterly, and at the same time most frank and candid 
exposition which it was ever our good fortune to listen to 
from a Finance Minister. There was a sustained buoy- 
ancy all through Mr. Gladstone's speech, and he was 
occasionally even humorous, so much so as to evoke a 
smile, and nearly a laugh from the iron gravity of ]Mr. 
Cobden, although he did not succeed in chasing away 
even for a moment that grim and querulous expression 
wliich seems to have settled permanently on the coun- 
tenance of Mr. Bright." 

The Budget of 1860, wdth its close associations with 
the Commercial Treaty which Mr. Cobden had just con- 
tracted with France, and with its daring abolition of over 
three hundred Customs duties, will probably remain Mr. 
Gladstone's most magnificent monument as a Minister of 
Finance. Considerable financial changes were expected 
on the re-assembling of Parliament. It was known that 
there would be a serious deficit in the revenue to be 
supplied, and at the same time that increased armaments 
and defensive preparations would make augmented de- 
mands upon the public expenditure. The falling in of a 
' number of Long Annuities would, however, furnish con- 
siderable, if not continuing, relief, and the character of 
the Chancellor of the Exchequer gave assurance that the 
opportunity now oJBfered would not be neglected. The 
IGth of February, a date considerably earlier than usual, 
w^as fixed for the Financial Statement. He walked up the 
House with an alacrity most surprising, as he had just 
risen from a sick bed, and bent his head with conscious 



112 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

pleasure before tlie hearty cheers which greeted his 
appearance. He spoke for four hours, without any trace 
of weakness, physical or mental. In his address he was 
playful and humorous, and the absence of " his accustomed 
touch of grimness" was remarked. Even gentlemen 
opposite were charmed into applause. The speech was 
so artistically arranged as to awake and retain attention, 
to pique and tease curiosity. It was not so much a 
speech as an oration, in the form of a great State paper 
made eloquent, in which there was a proper restraint over 
the crowding ideas, with nothing overlooked, and nothing 
put wrongly. 

Among the more salient points of the great scheme 
thus remarkably introduced, the following may be 
accepted as the more important : — There was a deficit of 
£9,400,000, in all, to be met. If the existing war duties 
on tea and sugar were retained, the deficit must be about 
£7,500,000. No radical change could be made in the 
expenditure of the year. But, nevertheless, he main- 
tained it was the duty of the Government to take further 
steps for the relief of trade and commerce in the direction 
of Free Trade. He then went on to explain in detail the 
concessions which we had made to France, and France to 
us, by terms of the Commercial Treaty. He denied that this 
treaty indicated any subserviency to France, and in glowing 
language called upon the two countries to inaugurate a 
new epoch of amity, as distinguished from former 
jealousy and ill feeling — a union of the two nations, 
not merely of the two Governments. The terms of the 
Treaty would cause a loss to the revenue of more than a 
million. But the loss was made up of remissions of pro- 
tective duties, every one of which would yield relief to 



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'1 



i 



THE COMMERCIAL TREATY WITH FRANCE. 113 

the poor man. What had been done would be good 
for this country if France had done nothing; it was 
better for us in proportion as France did something. A 
number of other Customs duties, not stipulated in the 
treaty, were also doomed to extinction, at a total cost 
of about £400,000 ; and others were lessened at about 
double the same loss. The revenue thus sacrificed was 
chiefly recouped by the extension of the use of stamps 
upon various classes of commercial instruments, dock 
and warehouse warrants, and the like. The revenue from 
licences to houses where all classes of refreshment are 
sold, would be also largely widened in the area of its yield. 
He then said that he proposed to abolish the excise duty 
on paper — a proposition in the attainment of which he 
was disappointed for another twelvemonth by the oppo- 
sition of the House of Lords. 

Summing up, he stated that the total of the altera- 
tions and reductions he had proposed would give in all a 
relief to the consumers of about four millions, while it 
would cost a nett loss to the revenue of little more than 
half, or about equivalent to the amount falling in from 
the cessation of the Long Annuities. On the Customs 
tariff there would only remain forty-eight articles ; and 
out of these only fifteen for purposes of revenue. To 
enable these great changes to be effected, the income 
tax was re-imposed, but for a year only; and a differ- 
ence was made between the rates levied on incomes 
above and below £150 a-year. He concluded, amid great 
cheering, with an appeal to the House to support the 
principles of commercial reform, for which the country 
had already received so much honour and reward in 
scattering blessini^ among the people of the country, 

H 



114 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

and which lie contended were carried out and advanced 
in his commercial plan. 

So sweeping and thoroughly Liberal a measure necessa- 
rily was met by the keenest opposition from the occupants 
of the Tory benches. In succession, hostile amendiaents 
by Mr. Disraeli and Mr. Ducane were defeated by large 
majorities — majorities so large as to be conclusive as to 
the ultimate success of the Treaty and the Budget. Mr. 
Gladstone thus eloquently concluded one of his addresses 
delivered at one stage of the protracted discussion of his 
scheme : — 

" There were times of old when Sovereigns made progresses through 
the land, and when, at the proclamation of their heralds, they caused to 
be scattered heaps of coin among the people. That may have been a 
goodly spectacle ; but it is also a goodly spectacle, in the altered spirit 
and circumstances of our times, when a Sovereign is enabled, through 
the wisdom of her great Council assembled in Parliament, again to 
scatter blessings among the people in the shape of wise and prudent 
laws, which do not sap, in any respect, the foundations of duty, but 
which strike away the shackles from the arm of industry, which give 
a new incentive and ne\T reward to toil, and which win more and more 
for the throne, and for the institutions of the country, the gratitude, 
the confidence, and the love of an united people. , . . We recommend 
this plan to your impartial and searching inquiry ; we do not presume 
to make a claim on your acknowledgments, but neither do we desire to 
draw on your generous confidence, nor to appeal to your compassion. 
We ask for nothing but impartial search and inquiry ; we know that it 
will receive that justice at your hand*, and we confidently anticipate in 
Lts behalf the approval alike of Parliament and of the people of this 
empire,** 



CHAPTER XI. 

THE LAST WHIG ADMINISTRATION, 

The Budget of 1861 was awaited with great anxiety, 
and it furnished an occasion for a very keen and pro- 
tracted party struggle. Mr. Gladstone, who spoke with 
exceptional brevity, concluded by moving three resolu- 
tions ; one remitting a penny of the income tax ; the 
second, for the continuance of the tea and sugar duties ; 
and the third, about which the great fight arose, for the 
tL** repeal of the paper duty. Mr. Disraeli went so far as 
to say that the Government had created an artificial 
surplus in order that they might perpetrate a financial 
caprice. On the ultimate and crucial division, on which 
the fate of the Ministry undoubtedly depended, the 
Government won by the sufficient majority of fifteen. 

Mr. Gladstone's Budget speech was universally ad- 
jnitted on all hands to be a peculiarly happy efibrt. One 
who heard him, remarked with surprise, that when he 
rose he had no facts or documents with him, and, 
although he afterwards produced what looked like a 
lirst copy-book for a very small child, the most careful 
observation did not cause the detection of any reference 
to that book, «xcept for the purpose of stating figures. 
The secret of the special charm of this speech lay in the 
fact that it was pervaded by good humour, and was not 

H 2 



116 . WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

verbose. He had a pleasant surprise in store for those 
hearers who had come to listen to a woful palinode, and 
there was a lurking sense of .good-humoured triumph 
over his avowed opponents, and still more over his skin- 
deep friends, which gave a lightness and buoyancy to 
his demeanour, which, of course, spread to his audience. 
But the chief merit of the speech, in respect to its 
object, was the remarkable dexterity with which it ap- 
pealed to the tastes, feelings, and opinions of both sides 
of the House. At one sentence, with his face half 
turned to the benches behind, Mr. Bright would break 
out into an involuntary cheer at once natural and hearty; 
while the very next moment the orator would lean, with 
a fascinating smile on his countenance, over the table to- 
wards gentlemen opposite, and minister to their weaknesses 
or prejudices with equal power and success. In every 
respect it was a masterpiece of oratory, and as it in the 
result actually led to something tangible — that is to say, 
to a surplus and a reduction of taxation — it was, of course, 
in every sense triumphant. 

The outbreak of the war in America had consider- 
able influence on the Budget of 1862. It was of a 
peculiarly simple character. Mr. Gladstone said that, in 
considering the causes which influenced the revenue for 
the year, they might all be expressed in one word — 
America ; and the main question in relation to our ex- 
port trade was, whether a large portion of the population 
of this country was to be supplied with the raw material, 
without which they would be deprived of employment' 
He referred with justifiable pride to the fact, that the 
increased trade which had been created by the treaty 
with France, had gone very far to make up for the 



THE LAST WHIG ADMINISTRATION. 117 

loss of business with America. He said he was spared 
the necessity of imposing any additional taxes, but was 
in the unpleasant position of being unable to remit any. 
An important minor point was the abolition of the pre- 
carious and irritating hop duty, and the substitution for 
it of a fixed tax of threepence per barrel on beer. He 
concluded a plain, and not in any way remarkable, address 
by emphasising that fact, to which, year by year, he re- 
curred, that if we hoped to effect a remission of taxation, 
it was not to be had except by judiciously and gradually, 
but resolutely, applying to every department of the public 
service the principles of true economy. Though not with- 
out considerable debate, the financial measures of the 
Government received the sanction of both Houses of 
Parliament. 

In this session there was an extremely animated 
discussion on the condition of the new Kingdom of Italy. 
Sir George Bowyer had made a speech highly eulogistic 
of the Papal temporal Government, and of tlie rule of 
the various dethroned princes ; and had drawn one of his 
fanciful glowing pictures of the new state of atilurs. 
Mr. Gladstone addressed himself energetically to the 
refutation at once of the laudations and invectives of the 
Papal baronet. He said. Sir George evidently regarded 
/ the improvements in the laws, the free institutions, and 
the social ameliorations introduced into the Kingdom 
of Italy, which others considered as demonstrations ot 
freedom, as nothing. The revolution took place but two 
years ago, and what had been the result in that short 
period 1 As regarded two-thirds of the Italian King- 
dom, Sir George had practically renounced and abandoned 
the case ; and as to the other third, it could clearly be 



118 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

shown that things were improving. With regard to 
Kome, Sir George required the House to believe that 
people were perfectly satisfied \ but there we're 20,000 
French troops kept there for some purpose, which had 
not been explained. Speaking as an individual, he said 
he could not but regret the continuance of that occupa- 
tion ; and he most earnestly hoped, for the sake of the 
name and the fame of JFrance — for the sake of humanity 
and the peace of Europe — ^it might soon be done away with. 
With respect to the temporal government of the Papacy, 
one of the questions involved in the discussion, Mr. Glad- 
stone argued, in powerful and uncompromising terms, the 
impolicy, as well as the injustice of prolonging it. 

There being a considerable surplus in 1863, the general 
expectation was, that the income tax and the tea duty 
would come in for reduction. Nor did Mr. Gladstone 
disappoint the general expectation and desire. He ap- 
peared in high spirits, as well he might. That the 
revenue exhibited such buoyancy, in spite of many adverse 
circumstances and heavy drawbacks, such as the American 
War, the extensive stoppage of manufactures at home, 
and the serious falling off in agricultural productions in 
Ireland, afforded ample ground of the soundness of the 
system which he had done so much to create. He was 
enabled to reduce the duty on tea from Is. 5d. to Is. a lb., 
and to give an abatement of 2d. to all classes of income- 
tax payers. The reception of the Budget was in the 
highest degree favourable. By this time Mr. Gladstone's 
management of the finances had become the very main 
strength and support of the otherwise lethargic and coma- 
tose Administration of the declining Lord Palmerston. 

An interesting personal incident associated with the 



THE LAST WHIG ADMINISTRATION. 119 

introduction of the Budget of 18G3, was the presence, for 
tlis first time, of one of the Queen's sons, Prince Alfred, 
accompanied by Prince Louis of Hesse, in the diplomatic 
gallery of the House. They, like all the world, wished 
to hear Mr. Gladstone convert figures into flowers of 
rhetoric. They may have been disappointed ; for he never 
delivered a less ambitious, plainer, or more straightforward 
financial statement. It was amusing to observe that 
whenever Mr. Gladstone made a point or got a cheer. 
Prince Louis turned to Prince Alfred for an explanation, 
which his Royal brother-in-law appeared either unable or 
disinclined to afford. Indeed, it appeared on the whole 
that the Princes were not overwhelmed with delight at 
what they heard, and seemed puzzled to make out why so 
much fuss had always been made about Mr. Gladstone's 
Budgets. At the end of two hours, they had had enough 
of it, and retired with alacrity. 

The effect on Mr. Disraeli was still more palpable, but 
from a different cause. He had deputed to Sir Stafford 
Northcote the task of picking up points for criticism, and 
that careful subordinate sat by his side, with an elabo- 
rate apparatus of note-book and pen. But as the speech 
went on, and disclosed a more and more pleasing con- 
dition of affairs, more stern and fixed grew Mr. Disraeli's 
face, and blanker and more lengthy grew Sir Stafford's. 
His note-book lay neglected on his knee, and his whole 
aspect and demeanour denoted that his occupation as 
second critic of the Budget was this time gone. Mr. 
Disraeli did not even stay to the end of the speech, but 
as soon as Mr. Gladstone got to what may be called the 
'supplement of his address, groped under his seat for his 
hat, and disappeared for the evening. 



120 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

The general election ol' 1S65 took place under cir- 
cumstances of rare tranquillity. There was no definite 
issue to be tried, no election "cry." The Parliament was 
near the period of its natural death, which the Palmer- 
ston Ministry chose by a slight interval to anticipate. 
The Government appealed with confidence to the success 
of their efibrts in maintaining external peace, and to the 
triumphant result of their commercial and financial 
policy ; and they counted on a certain, though moderate 
accession of strength in the new Parliament. The only 
exciting contests were those for the University of Oxford 
and the City of I^ondon. Mr. Gladstone had indicated 
certain symptoms of a willingness to take into considera- 
tion the alleged abuses of the Irish Establishment ; and 
the Church and State element at Oxford was at once 
aroused against him. Mr. Gathorne Hardy was put up 
as a candidate to oppose him, and their respective friends 
made the most strenuous exertions in the favour of each. 
Had the election depended upon the resident members 
of the University, Mr. Gladstone's return would have 
been certain, but the new voting paper system, by which 
thousands of the country clergy and squires could record 
their suffrages without any trouble or expense, proved 
fatal to his candidature. At the close of the poll, which 
lasted five days, Mr. Hardy was 180 a-head of his illus- 
trious rival. Thus terminated, after eighteen years' 
faithful service, Mr. Gladstone's connection with that 
academic seat, of which he has been the greatest lay orna- 
ment in his and our time. 

The election for South Lancashire was still open,, 
and preparations for a keen struggle between the Liberal 
and Conservative parties had for some time been made. 



THE LAST WHIG ADMINISTRATION. 121 

On the 17th of July the nomination had taken place, 
and Mr. Gladstone's name had been proposed, ere the 
result at Oxford was as yet known. On the 18th, Mr. 
Gladstone went to Manchester, where he had a conference 
with the Liberal Election Committee, the result of which 
was the immediate issue of this address : — 

** I appear before you as a candidate for the suffrages of your divisisn 
of my native county. Time forbids me to enlarge on the numerous 
topics which justly engage the public interest. I will bring them all 
to a single head. You are conversant — few so much so — with the 
legislation of the last thirty-five years. You have seen, you have felt, 
its results. You cannot fail to have observed the verdict which the 
country generally has, within the last eight days, pronounced upon the 
relative claims and positions of the two great political parties with 
respect to that legislation in the past, and to the prospective adminis- 
tration of public affairs. I humbly, but confidently, without the least 
disparagement to many excellent persons from whom I have the mis- 
fortune frequently to difter, ask you to give your powerful voice in 
confirmation of that verdict, and to pronounce with significance as to 
the direction in which you desire the wheels of the State to move. 
Before these words can be read, I hope to be among you in the hives of 
your teeming enterprise." 

The election took place two days after. The consti- 
tuency returned three members. Two Tories stood first 
and second, Mr. Gladstone heading the fourth on the 
•list by less than three hundred votes out of nearly 9,000 
recorded in his favour. Mr. Gladstone's return for Lan- 
cashire was not regarded by the Liberals — who looked 
upon him as their future leader — as a subject of greater 
congratTilation than his rej ection at Oxford. They thought 
he was fettered by^the latter connection, and would advance 
more quickly as a non-academic member. The result has 
demonstrated the accuracy of their surmise and hope. 

Lord Palmerston died on the 18th of October, 1865, 



122 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTCNE. 

and a few days after, his honoured remains were laid 
in Westminster Abbey. With him, every one felt that 
an era of English history had passed away, and that the 
party of which he had been the head up to the moment 
of his decease, must at once, or soon, develop a decisive 
and an unmistakable policy. The first question that 
arose was, who shall be his successor ? The names of 
Mr. Gladstone and Lord Granville were for a few days in 
some men's mouths j but Earl E-ussell was appointed 
Premier. Mr. Gladstone, however, was the real inspiring 
spirit of the reconstituted Cabinet. During the recess, 
public curiosity grew keener as to whether the Russell- 
Gladstone Cabinet would introduce a Keform Bill, and 
that a truly Liberal one. In November, Mr. Bright, 
speaking at Birmingham, and evidently with authority, 
stated that the Ministry was *' pledged to introduce a 
measure of Parliamentary Reform, and an extended 
suffrage for the people — and I believe it will redeem its t> 
pledge." This significant utterance gave great satisfac- 
tion to the thinking portion of the unenfranchised classes, 
and to the Liberal section of the community generally 
throughout the land. 

On the 12th of March, 1866, Mr. Gladstone introduced 
the Reform Bill which will continue identified with his 
name, and frankly and unreservedly announced that the , 
Government staked their existence on the issue they had 
raised. His memorable phrase was : — " We have crossed 
the Rubicon, and burned our boats." Yet the speech 
in which he introduced the measure lacked his usual fire, 
and the spontaneity and unforced eloquence which he 
had frequently expended on inferior themes. The chief 
promises of the measure were, the lowering of the 



THE LAST WHIG ADMINISTRATION. 123 

county occupation francliise to <£14, and the borough to 
iE7, the addition of a <£10 borough lodger franchise, a 
£50 savings' bank franchise, the disfranchisement of per- 
sons employed in Government yards, and others, which 
are now of no interest. 

When Mr, Gladstone rose, on the 12th of April, 
to move the second reading of the Bill, he entered a 
second time — and, being now fairly put on his mettle by 
opposition, with his wonted fire — on the vindication of 
the principles of the proposal. He thus concluded : — 
" Enough, and more than enough, of vain, idle, and 
mocking words have been uttered. Acts and deeds are 
wanted. I beseech you to be wise, and, above all, to be 
wise in time." When he sat down, Lord Grosvendr 
moved an amendment, which was seconded by Lord 
Stanley. After several nights' debate, in which all the 
Parliamentary athletes took part, Mr. Gladstone replied, 
closing with the emphatic words, " You cannot fight 
against the future; time is on our side. The great 
social forces are against you. They are arrayed — they 
are marshalled on our side. The banner which we carry, 
although it may, perhaps, at this moment droop over our 
sinking heads, yet it will soar again, and float in the light 
of heaven, and will be borne in the firm hands of the 
united people of these three kingdoms — not, perhaps, to 
an easy, but to a certain and not distant future." 

Amid the most tumultuous cheering, Mr. Gladstone 
resumed his seat ; and the division was at once taken, all 
men's hearts present throbbing with excitement. The 
result was, for the second reading, 318; against, 313 — 
majority, five. 

'Twere tedious to recite at length the subsequent 



124 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

movements made against the Bill. The end approached. 
On Mr. Walpole's motion to raise the county quali- 
fication from £14: to £20, the Ministerial majority 
amounted to fourteen, all the Tories and all the " Adul- 
lamites " — that exquisitely humorous term of Mr. 
Bright's application — still, to a man, voting one way. 
A somewhat similar amendment by Mr. Ward Hunt 
reduced the majority to five, the point at which it had 
stood in the instance of the attack led by Lord Gros- 
venor. At last came the amendment of Lord Dunkellin, 
a Whig, and the son of an ex- Whig Cabinet Minister, 
substituting rating for rental ; in other words, greatly 
lessening the scope of the area of enfranchisement. On 
this. Ministers were beaten by eleven. Forthwith, Mr. 
Gladstone informed the House that the Ministers had 
made a communication to Her Majesty ; the nature of, 
and reply to which, he could not divulge until after a 
few days' delay — the Queen being at Balmoral. After 
a week's suspense and anxiety, Earl Bussell and Mr. Glad- 
stone stated that the Ministers had determined upon the 
alternative of resignation. This greatly chagrined not a 
few of the Adullamites, who had not contemplated such a 
result* But Mr. Gladstone reminded his auditors of his 
expressed determination to stand or fall by his measure. 
He might have reminded them that he not only "be- 
sought them to be wise, but to be wise in time." 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE IRISH CHURCH STRUGGLE. 

In the session of 1868, Mr. Gladstone thoroughly succeeded 
in rallying round him once more the whole body of the 
Liberals. The "AduUamites" and the " Tea-room party" 
were blotted out of existence. Not only did he succeed in 
re-uniting his disorganised party, but he associated the last 
session of the dying Parliament with an almost certain 
triumph of the future. His good fortune, rather than 
any marvellous prevision, enabled him to associate his 
own legitimate ambition with what many believe to be the 
cause of expediency and justice. There was a felicitous 
coincidence uniting party interests with what a large 
class believed to be the demands of duty. 

The Government itself had led up to the subject of 
Irish legislation ; as the event proved, thereby playing 
into their adversaries' hands. Mr. Gladstone naturally 
took the place of Ministers from the moment it appeared 
that they had no definite policy to suggest. Before the 
opening of the session. Lord Stanley had stated at Bristol, 
that the Irish question imperatively demanded immediate 
solution, and it was afterwards formally announced in 
both Houses that the result of the deliberations of the 
Cabinet would be stated by the Irish Secretary. On 
the 10th of March, after Mr. Maguire had, with remark- 



126 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

able ditfuseness, recited the long list of Irish grievances, 
Lord Mayo rose to redeem the pledge of his colleagues. 
He disappointed both friends and foes by his announce- 
ment of the intention to establish and endow an Irish 
Koman Catholic university, and the promotion of religious 
equality by a process of "levelling up," which was 
understood to mean the partial endowment of the 
Catholics and such of the Nonconformists as would 
accept State aid. Mr. Gladstone instantly seized the 
opportunity afforded by the development of so crude and 
unsatisfactory a scheme. At the conclusion of aja address, 
elaborate beyond measure, and irritating by its absence 
Sv of practical suggestion or revelation of policy, he declared 
/just ere sitting down, in the plainest and most unmis- 
takable language, that the Irish Church must cease to 
exist as an establishment. The fact of the thorough 
acquiescence of his party became speedily apparent ; Earl 
E/Ussell himself being the first to withdraw his published 
scheme for the division of Church property in favour of 
Mr. Gladstone's bolder and simpler proposal. 

A fortnight afterwards, he moved that the House 
should go into committee for the purpose of considering 
a series of three resolutions, which affirmed, in few 
phrases, the expediency of the disestablishment and dis- 
endowment of the Irish Church. He proposed to 
recognise all vested interests and all private benefactions 
to the Church, and to apply the marginal sums not so 
absorbed to purposes connected with the general benefit 
of all classes — carefully, however, avoiding all detail or 
even clue to his intentions on the latter point. It was 
expected that the Government would meet this stroke 
either by a direct negative, or by moving the previous 



THE IRISH CHURCH STRUGGLE. 127 

question ; but Lord Stanley laid upon the table a colour- 
less amendment, the purpoi-t of which was to leave the 
whole matter open to the consideration of a new Parlia- 
ment. He was bold enough, when speaking on behalf 
of his amendment, to admit that no educated man could 
either defend the existing condition of the Irish Church, 
or rest satisfied with an internal re-distribution of its 
endowments, such as had been effected by his father 
thirty-five years before. This alarmed the bulk of the 
Tory party; and Mr. Gathorne Hardy, speaking as their 
mouthj)ieoe, attached to the amendment a high Con- 
servative and ultra-Protestant interpretation. The 
exigency of the case compelled Mr. Disraeli to endorse 
this version. The issue between the two great rivals was 
made unmistakably clear and definite. On a division, 
Mr. Gladstone won by the telling majority of sixty. 
, We here insert the following anecdote, neither vouch- 

ing for, nor throVing doubts upon its accuracy. Nor 
would it find a place in our pages, but for the circum- 
stance that it is extracted from a communication inserted, 
after the close of the session, in the Guardian^ a Church 
newspaper, with which it is matter of notoriety that Mr. 
Gladstone has long held peculiarly intimate relations : — 

^ "When Mr. Gladstone gave notice of his resolutions, a Roman 
Catholic gentleman of great ability, who enjoys the confidence of the 
Irish hierarchy, and is deep in the secrets of the Vatican, requested 
an interview with Mr. Gladstone, to whom he was till then, I believe, 
personally a stranger. In that interview he urged on Mr. Gladstone 

^ the abandonment of his Irish Church policy as being most prejudicial 
to the interests of the Roman Catholic Church. Mr. Gladstone replied, 
I believe, somewhat as follows : — That he had considered the question 
in all its bearings ; that the disestablishment of the Irish Church was 
fen act of political justice ; that justice would, in the long run, be 



128 WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE. 

beneficial to all legitimate interests ; that the time had, in his opinion, 
arrived for declaring a policy for Ireland ; that the disestablishment 
of the Irish Church seemed to him to be both the most just and tlie 
only satisfactory policy, and l|that he was determined to risk his 
political future on its accomplishment. When you consider the state 
of opinion at the time, the risk was very great, though Mr. Gladstone's 
unexpected success has made the public insensible to the danger he 
was running of making shipwreck of his political reputation. If he 
had failed, it would have discredited his statesmanship for years to 
congfij^ and failure was clearly on the cards, and was, at first, confidently 
predicted by the Tory press, and even by the PaU Mall Gazette, and, I 
think, the Satwrday Review.'''' 

After tlie Easter recess, the first resolution was re- 
affirmed by a majority increased to sixty-five, and for a 
few days it was alternately reported that Ministers 
would either resign, or make an appeal to the existing 
unreformed constituencies. Ultimately, however, the 
Premier stated that he would carry the session to its ter- 
mination, and reserve the final decision of the great issue 
for the arbitrement of the new and eillarged constituen- 
cies in the succeeding November. 

A complementary measure for suspending all nomina- 
tions to vacant benefices in the gift of the Crown, was 
passed by the Commons and rejected by the Peers. The 
conflicting decisions of the two Houses left a definite 
issue which admits of no compromise, and which must 
necessarily be fought out at the hustings. Even Lord * 
Salisbury admitted in his place that, on this, as on all 
questions of similar importance, the will of the House of 
Commons, if endorsed by the nation, must ultimately 
prevail. Such was the issue on which the newly-enfran- i 
chised had to record their first verdict. 







4 





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THE RIGHT HON. 

W. E. 

Gladstone. 




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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 






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